noralee
"Girls Can't Swim (Les filles ne savent pas nager)" gets a lot right about teens, in a debut by writer/director Anne-Sophie Birot: The endless summer feeling of life Down the Shore (only here the Shore is at Brittany so there's no Bruce Springsteen music, let alone any beach music). The implied class tensions between townies and seasonals. The restless rebellion of adolescence, particularly as bursting sensuality.The casual back-and-forth between parents and teens as the kids alternate between neediness and independence, complicated by the parents' own financial and relationship problems.And most particularly the exaggerated passions of teen girl friendship. But the aimlessness of summer vacation is mimicked too much in the pacing, with an abrupt culmination that's not fair to the characters. I must have missed the explanation for the title. Clearly Eric Rohmer's "Pauline on the Beach" has haunted today's French women filmmakers as this is the second such movie I've seen in a year that feels like an angry response to that sage putting a teen girl amidst adult sharks, after "Fat Girl (a ma soeur)."(originally written 5/11/2002)
John G
Gwen is a totally unsympathetic character who goes from ballistic to sweet and back in just about every scene she is in. He father is lazy and drunk most of the time and only her mother is a fully functioning person. It seems Gwen's sole motivation is to screw and screw around, but she has neither sense nor sensuality. Lise has a mother who goes to pieces when her ex-husband dies, motivating Lise to run away to see Gwen. Lise, thus far not experienced in the ways of the flesh, has a crush on Gwen that is not returned, and then punishes Gwen for spurning her interest by sabotaging Gwen's "romances". A much more rewarding film is "Lost and Delirious (2001)" where the girls have full-fledged and sympathetically drawn characters and the angst is real and realistic.
kranbot
My sister and I saw this film at the Music Box Theatre in Chicago. The film seemed to drag on forever without much forward motion. When it finally ended, the entire audience burst out laughing--a very odd response to a tragic narrative. I'm not really sure why everyone laughed--nervous tension, perhaps, since the film ends on a down-note. But, it was more than that. It seems that the pacing and the setting were so culturally removed from what most Americans are used to that the film seems almost absurd. Absurd is really not the right word--perhaps the film is just very difficult to identify with due to the overlong and tedious pacing and the utter lack of humorous moments to offset the downward spiral into sadness. I hate to mention cultural difference as being a reason to judge a film, but clearly some universal message was missing. Kieslowski's _Ten Commandments_ are examples of films that depict a very different culture from what some people in other countries might experience, but Kieslowski manages to instill a sense of humanity and timelessness to his work that _Girls Can't Swim_ cannot seem to muster. And from my perspective, the two girls simply weren't very compelling. One teenage girl explores sex, the other is depressed over her father's death and does things like see how long she can hold her breath under water. Ho hum. Both could have used a bit more character development. This isn't a bad film--just a very slow, humorless one.
rlcsljo
Was this supposed to be the french "Marny". I don't know, I just know that the lead girl was pretty boring. When her girlfriend finally showed up, it was too late to save the film.I never could figure out where anyone was coming from, except the father and he was portrayed as being unsympathetic.The mother needed a bigger role, as the director found out too late.
AD
