TOMBOY (2011)

Current doyen of French Radical Queer filmmaking, yet little that’s ‘Radically Queer’ in this masterly second feature from writer/director Céline Sciamma.  Something that’s also true of her latest, PETIT MAMAN/’19.*  But where that story ran on a kind of meta-physical magical realism (and a wrinkle in time), this earlier work is more Neo-Realistic DOGME as summer brings new house/new neighborhood to 12-yr-old Laure (Zoé Héran), her parents & little sister.  Blessed with enchanting looks, she’s soon bonding in unsupervised outdoor play with new local pals not as Laure, but ‘passing’ as a boy, ‘Mikael,’ puberty delayed just enough to let her join in ‘skins’ vs. ‘shirts’ roughhousing, soccer, even swimming.  (The last by cutting down a girl’s one-piece into a boy’s brief.  Pudenda courtesy of her sister’s molding clay.)  And so it goes, every encounter a hurdle of subterfuge, especially when a slightly more physically mature 12-yr-old girl develops a crush on ‘Mikael.’  Hard to know which is the bigger problem: peeing in the field with the guys or finding out you liked kissing a girl.*  And while we know this will all soon crumble (school-days with the gang just around the corner), the suspense can be overwhelming.  Sciamma with a knack of setting up, then just avoiding kiddie coming-of-age tropes.  But she can’t stop little sister from being a girly girl (ballet, tutu, the works) and tripping things up when she tries too hard to help.  You’d need to go back to François Truffaut’s SMALL CHANGE/’76 to find equal levels of tween identification.  And not even there, a parent who knows how much and when a bit of tough love will be just the thing to solve unsolvable embarrassments and give a child time to begin to figure things out in a safe/loving environment.  All while a new baby, a boy with a full head of hair, joins the family.

DOUBLE-BILL/LINK:  As mentioned, PETIT MAMAN Sciamma’s latest; OR: SMALL CHANGE/’76.  http://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2023/12/petit-maman-2021.html      https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2008/06/small-change-1976.html

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID:  One more Family Friendly label on a film with a tricky topic worthy of further discussion.  (Plus a touch of childhood nudity to consider.)  Tomboy phase?  Trans of some sort?  Future sexual identification undecided.  Where might she/he/they/thee be going?  Alas, chances of showing this film in, say, a Stateside junior high class currently unimaginable in ‘fly-over’ country where it’s probably most needed.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY:  *Hopefully, their high school will put on AS YOU LIKE IT and cast these two in it.