Title: Young & Beautiful (Jeune Et Jolie)
Release Date: 2014-04-25
Genres: Drama
High essence:
"PHOTOS: Star-Studded Jury Lands in Cannes Given that much of the plot centers on the double life led by 17-year-old Isabelle (Vacth), who drifts from the loss of her virginity into prostitution while still a student, superficial comparisons with the 1967 Luis Bunuel classic Belle de Jour are inevitable.""Such openness is welcome, and it puts great emphasis on Vacth's performance – and on the film as a character study – as we strain to read her behaviour, her few words, even the look in her eyes."
"Review by Louise Keller: Francois Ozon's intriguing exploration of a young girl's sexuality fascinates yet frustrates as she secretly steps into a life of prostitution."
"Owen's other posts from Cannes: Cannes 2013: The girls have gone wild in The Bling Ring, Sofia Coppola's most provocative film to date Cannes 2013: The Past, the new film by the director of A Separation, confirms Asghar Farhadi as a modern master Cannes 2013: The Coen brothers Inside Llewyn Davis is a close-to-the-bone portrait of the early- 60s New York folk scene, but it is also (what else?"
"The first time we lay eyes on 17-year-old Isabelle, played by fantastic newcomer Marine Vacth, it is seeing her sunbathing topless on a pebbled beach through the eyes of her prepubescent brother, aided by binoculars."
"In such films as Under the Sand , 8 Women , Potiche , and his biggest crossover success to date, 2003's kinky thriller Swimming Pool , Ozon has proved time and again that he isn t just fascinated by the opposite sex, he wants to portray women as thinking, feeling, three-dimensional characters."
"Next thing you know it's a few months later and this young and beautiful (that's what the title means, by the way) girl is now a high priced Internet call girl."
Medium essence:
David Rooney:- PHOTOS: Cannes Competition Lineup Features 'Behind the Candelabra,' 'Only God Forgives,' 'Nebraska' The opening visual invites us to participate as voyeurs in Isabelle's transformative journey as her kid brother Victor ( Fantin Ravat ) watches through binoculars while she sunbathes topless on a beach near the family's summer vacation villa.
- This aptly titled latest film from François Ozon is both psychologically probing and unerringly elegant in its nonjudgmental restraint, driven by a transfixing performance from the incandescent Marine Vacth that will land her major exposure on the casting radar.
- PHOTOS: Star-Studded Jury Lands in Cannes Given that much of the plot centers on the double life led by 17-year-old Isabelle (Vacth), who drifts from the loss of her virginity into prostitution while still a student, superficial comparisons with the 1967 Luis Bunuel classic Belle de Jour are inevitable.
Dave Calhoun:
- François Ozon tiptoes gracefully through a minefield in 'Young & Beautiful', the story of a 17-year-old girl, Isabelle (former model Marine Vacth), from a comfortable Parisian background, who decides to become a high-class prostitute in between school and negotiating the normal ups and downs of family life.
- Her testy relationship with her understanding, if distracted, mother (Géraldine Pailhas) is skillfully drawn and quietly unknowable.
- Such openness is welcome, and it puts great emphasis on Vacth's performance – and on the film as a character study – as we strain to read her behaviour, her few words, even the look in her eyes.
Louise Keller:
- Review by Louise Keller: Francois Ozon's intriguing exploration of a young girl's sexuality fascinates yet frustrates as she secretly steps into a life of prostitution.
- The jump from losing her virginity to turning tricks is almost instant and seemingly unmotivated by anything in her life, not even money, which she secretly collects at 300 euros a pop.
- In the lead up to her 17th birthday, it is clear that her intention to lose her virginity is not coloured by romantic notions; the fact that Isabelle is shown 'watching' the sex act is curious in itself.
Owen Gleiberman:
- Isabelle suggests an Internet-baby version of Catherine Deneuve in Belle de Jour (whose attraction to prostitution also wasn t explained ).
- Owen's other posts from Cannes: Cannes 2013: The girls have gone wild in The Bling Ring, Sofia Coppola's most provocative film to date Cannes 2013: The Past, the new film by the director of A Separation, confirms Asghar Farhadi as a modern master Cannes 2013: The Coen brothers Inside Llewyn Davis is a close-to-the-bone portrait of the early- 60s New York folk scene, but it is also (what else?
- It's the story of Isabelle (Marine Vacth), who's your basic blas 17-year-old Paris bourgeois princess, except that when she loses her virginity (in a momentary summer fling with a hunky German dude), she feels nothing, and this propels her to begin the fall school season by hiring herself out as a high-end prostitute.
Sam Bathe:
- Jeune et Jolie gives away little enough to be enigmatic as Marine Vacth's engaging and truthful performance plays well with an uneasy story of innocence lost.
- One thing that we do know is that these encounters fill Isabelle with a budding sense of power, as displayed in a scene where she sees one of her Johns out in the wild and realises that he has more to lose from uncovering their previous meetings than she does.
- The first time we lay eyes on 17-year-old Isabelle, played by fantastic newcomer Marine Vacth, it is seeing her sunbathing topless on a pebbled beach through the eyes of her prepubescent brother, aided by binoculars.
Chris Nashawaty:
- In such films as Under the Sand , 8 Women , Potiche , and his biggest crossover success to date, 2003's kinky thriller Swimming Pool , Ozon has proved time and again that he isn t just fascinated by the opposite sex, he wants to portray women as thinking, feeling, three-dimensional characters.
- Part of the power of both films lies in how the audience projects motivations onto these women.
- Ostensibly the story of a disaffected Parisian teenager named Isabelle (Marine Vacth) with a secret life as a prostitute, the film has an obvious touchstone: Luis Bu uel's dreamlike 1967 S&M fantasy Belle de Jour , which starred Catherine Deneuve as an emotionally chilly housewife who moonlights as a call girl.
Jordan Hoffman:
- Next thing you know it's a few months later and this young and beautiful (that's what the title means, by the way) girl is now a high priced Internet call girl.
- She does tend to take what can only be described as Silkwood showers after each encounter, so there's a part of her that's grossed out.
- isn't just what her mother wants to know when she inevitably finds out.
Low essence:
David Rooney:- A fascinating contemplation of adolescent sexuality that will be a star-making platform CANNES – The mysteries of adolescence, and in particular, the sense of control and power that can accompany a gorgeous girl's discovery of her sexuality, are explored with hypnotic focus in Young & Beautiful (Jeune & Jolie) .
- PHOTOS: Cannes Competition Lineup Features 'Behind the Candelabra,' 'Only God Forgives,' 'Nebraska' The opening visual invites us to participate as voyeurs in Isabelle's transformative journey as her kid brother Victor ( Fantin Ravat ) watches through binoculars while she sunbathes topless on a beach near the family's summer vacation villa.
- In the autumn section, during which Isabelle embarks on a secret life of turning tricks after school at rendezvous hotels, Ozon cuts together students from her class in direct-to-camera readings from the Rimbaud poem No One's Serious at Seventeen.
- Whether being treated curtly by an arrogant john, used purely as an object of pleasure or regarded with the desire softened by protectiveness of a rueful sixtyish man ( Johan Leysen ) who becomes her one regular customer, Isabelle retains a veneer of detachment.
- This aptly titled latest film from François Ozon is both psychologically probing and unerringly elegant in its nonjudgmental restraint, driven by a transfixing performance from the incandescent Marine Vacth that will land her major exposure on the casting radar.
- A hard partier in her own youth, Isabelle's mother, Sylvie ( Geraldine Pailhas ), has the toughest time coming to terms with her daughter's inscrutable choices.
- PHOTOS: Star-Studded Jury Lands in Cannes Given that much of the plot centers on the double life led by 17-year-old Isabelle (Vacth), who drifts from the loss of her virginity into prostitution while still a student, superficial comparisons with the 1967 Luis Bunuel classic Belle de Jour are inevitable.
Dave Calhoun:
- François Ozon tiptoes gracefully through a minefield in 'Young & Beautiful', the story of a 17-year-old girl, Isabelle (former model Marine Vacth), from a comfortable Parisian background, who decides to become a high-class prostitute in between school and negotiating the normal ups and downs of family life.
- A scene late at night with her stepfather (Frédéric Pierrot) is uncomfortable and upsetting as she brings home the superficial charm she uses to win over clients.
- Her testy relationship with her understanding, if distracted, mother (Géraldine Pailhas) is skillfully drawn and quietly unknowable.
- The songs that mark the change of seasons are trite and obvious ('The little girl you knew is no more,' offers one, bluntly), and other attempts to counter Isabelle's opacity, such as her classmates reciting the French poet Rimbaud, feel similarly forced.
- Such openness is welcome, and it puts great emphasis on Vacth's performance – and on the film as a character study – as we strain to read her behaviour, her few words, even the look in her eyes.
- It's obvious that at 3-500 euros a trick, she is not likely to find much besides paid-for encounters in hotel rooms with much older men who has the money, her teenage colleagues.
- She's hard and experienced beyond her years I would have said she was scared about what might happen at the hands of these men violence being one of the reasons that the special sex worker-client zone was set up in Zurich.
Louise Keller:
- story of seventeen-year-old Isabelle's (Marine Vacth) sexual journey over four seasons (accompanied by four Francoise Hardy songs) from the awakening of her desires to her first time, from her exploration of sex to her search for her identity.
- Review by Louise Keller: Francois Ozon's intriguing exploration of a young girl's sexuality fascinates yet frustrates as she secretly steps into a life of prostitution.
- The jump from losing her virginity to turning tricks is almost instant and seemingly unmotivated by anything in her life, not even money, which she secretly collects at 300 euros a pop.
- It begins in summer, when Isabelle loses her virginity, for example.
- It is however, a star-making performance from Vacth, whose luminous screen presence is the film's calling card, as she switches from freckle-faced schoolgirl to serene seductress at call.
- The tantalising opening shot through a pair of binoculars, reveals a beautiful young girl on the beach removing her bikini-top.
- In the lead up to her 17th birthday, it is clear that her intention to lose her virginity is not coloured by romantic notions; the fact that Isabelle is shown 'watching' the sex act is curious in itself.
Owen Gleiberman:
- She designs her own Web site, with alluring cell-phone photos, and meets men after school, in hotels or in their cars, calling herself L a and wearing a secretary's skirt, respectable heels, and lipstick that makes her look maybe 20 years old (until she takes off her clothes, at which point it's clear that she's a skinny kid), and charging 300 Euros for them to sleep with her.
- Isabelle suggests an Internet-baby version of Catherine Deneuve in Belle de Jour (whose attraction to prostitution also wasn t explained ).
- Marina Vacth is a gorgeous young actress, but she looks so much like a Euro-pouty Kristen Stewart fashion model that, at first, I feared she d fall into that tradition of frozen-faced French ingenues who pass off their lack of expression as mystery.
- Stranger by the Lake is voyeuristic, all right, but in a way that evokes the Hitchcock of Rear Window more than it does the Friedkin of Cruising .
- The movie shows us men sprawled naked on the beach with their junk hanging out, to the point that we get as used to it as they are, and it lingers on random erotic encounters, the camera peering through the dense piny woods, portraying the hookups without judgment and often with a casual explicitness that's attuned to just how far mainstream audiences have come (though the movie may have to be trimmed of a few hardcore shots if it wants to open in the U.
- Owen's other posts from Cannes: Cannes 2013: The girls have gone wild in The Bling Ring, Sofia Coppola's most provocative film to date Cannes 2013: The Past, the new film by the director of A Separation, confirms Asghar Farhadi as a modern master Cannes 2013: The Coen brothers Inside Llewyn Davis is a close-to-the-bone portrait of the early- 60s New York folk scene, but it is also (what else?
- It's the story of Isabelle (Marine Vacth), who's your basic blas 17-year-old Paris bourgeois princess, except that when she loses her virginity (in a momentary summer fling with a hunky German dude), she feels nothing, and this propels her to begin the fall school season by hiring herself out as a high-end prostitute.
Sam Bathe:
- Jeune et Jolie gives away little enough to be enigmatic as Marine Vacth's engaging and truthful performance plays well with an uneasy story of innocence lost.
- These questions all develop as Isabelle decides to embark on a new hobby as a high-end hooker going by the name of Lea, purporting to be 20-years-old and charging 300 per session.
- One thing that we do know is that these encounters fill Isabelle with a budding sense of power, as displayed in a scene where she sees one of her Johns out in the wild and realises that he has more to lose from uncovering their previous meetings than she does.
- The way in which she deals with this again leaves a lot to be interpreted by the viewer themselves.
- The first time we lay eyes on 17-year-old Isabelle, played by fantastic newcomer Marine Vacth, it is seeing her sunbathing topless on a pebbled beach through the eyes of her prepubescent brother, aided by binoculars.
- Towards the final third of the picture, there are hints that we re going to be spoon-fed a conclusion where one isn t required, but rest assured, Isabelle and the film as a whole are a conundrum right to the end.
- This is the kind of film which I like, where you re dropped into a life then unceremoniously pulled away again, left only with your own thoughts and co nclusions as you exit the cinema.
Chris Nashawaty:
- In such films as Under the Sand , 8 Women , Potiche , and his biggest crossover success to date, 2003's kinky thriller Swimming Pool , Ozon has proved time and again that he isn t just fascinated by the opposite sex, he wants to portray women as thinking, feeling, three-dimensional characters.
- Part of the power of both films lies in how the audience projects motivations onto these women.
- But even if Isabelle's inner motives remain enigmatic, at least Ozon is interested in posing questions about rebellion and female desire that few male directors even bother to consider.
- Ostensibly the story of a disaffected Parisian teenager named Isabelle (Marine Vacth) with a secret life as a prostitute, the film has an obvious touchstone: Luis Bu uel's dreamlike 1967 S&M fantasy Belle de Jour , which starred Catherine Deneuve as an emotionally chilly housewife who moonlights as a call girl.
- When the film begins, Isabelle and her family are on vacation and, on the eve of her 17th birthday, she loses her virginity in a fling with a handsome German tourist (Lucas Prisor).
Jordan Hoffman:
- Next thing you know it's a few months later and this young and beautiful (that's what the title means, by the way) girl is now a high priced Internet call girl.
- She does tend to take what can only be described as Silkwood showers after each encounter, so there's a part of her that's grossed out.
- isn't just what her mother wants to know when she inevitably finds out.
Source:
http://www.film.com/movies/jeune-et-jolie-review
http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20809609,00.html
http://insidemovies.ew.com/2013/05/17/cannes-sex-comes-to-the-art-house/
http://www.urbancinefile.com.au/home/view.asp?a=20353&s=Reviews
http://www.timeout.com/london/film/jeune-et-jolie
http://fanthefiremagazine.com/blog/film/film-review-jeune-et-jolie/
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/young-beautiful-cannes-review-523930