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48 out of 52 people found the following comment useful :- One has to trust the auteur, this is extremely valid art, 8 March 2002 Author: mikenuell from San Francisco
The auteur took a risk on this one and got screwed for it. But to invalidate it as art, especially in the light of compelling but questionable films such as "Baise Moi," is wrong.This film is beautiful, well made, very artistic, has great thematic depth and makes a statement. What more are we looking for when we define something as art?The first clue should be in the title: "A Real Young Girl.' Our culture (male dominant still,) is fascinated with sexualizing what are in our cultural context, inappropriately young females, that is, pubescent, underaged, or more gracefully put "blossoming." This is a complex issue not for discussion here, but the point is, artistic treatments of this subject have been predominantly male. So a "Real Young Girl" may be a statement indicating that the director is going to show you early adolescent female sexuality as it truly is, from someone who has experienced it first hand, and not as it is eroticized by male artists.I think a big point of this film is that it is not pleasant and not easy, not fun or romantic, but painful, confusing, and filled with difficult feelings and disgust.While the film is beautiful and leaves one with a not unpleasant feeling (it's a good film, the ending is abrupt and funny, but no more so than other great avant-garde or new-wave filmmakers.)The eroticism can in no way be seen as pornography, though. Despite the explicitness of its photography (of the vagina especially,) there is no actual sex, and these explicit scenes are mixed with other aspects that open them to complex interpretation.For instance, the main character undresses and experiments by putting red ink on her erogenous zones, but during the whole scene, a fly is very persistently buzzing around the room. I'm not going to go into detail interpreting, but you get my point.Another very explicit scene, the character in her fantasy, bound with barbed-wire, spread eagled naked on the ground. We see very explicit close-up of her vagina, but this is concurrent with her fantasy lover dangling a live worm over it, and eventually pulling the worm apart and dropping the still squirming bits on her pubis.Or a scene where walking on the beach to another fantasy, she drops her panties on the decaying corpse of a dog.Again, interpret for yourself, but you'll see not only a depth of symbol, but a unity of theme in the natural world and decay as related to this young girl's perception of her vagina: something akin to stinky, swampy pit- far from the ripe, juicy peach of male imagination.It gives what seems to my male mind, a convincing portrayal of early adolescent female sexuality from the perspective of a woman.The director clearly loves the female form but the film is no more explicit, and certainly less shocking, than say Pasolini's "Salo." (In fact, if Pier had been attracted to women, I suspect he would have given us similarly graphic views instead of tending to orient on penises of extraordinary size.) It's hard to find this film exploitative in comparison to such celebrated films as "Last Tango in Paris."I could go on and on but the point is, this is not a gray area somewhere near pornography, but a valid, necessary, and probably important (though only history will tell,) work.
27 out of 33 people found the following comment useful :- A visceral pre-figurative work., 26 August 2000 Author: Narain Jashanmal (njashanmal@hotmail.com) from New York
The first film from Catherine Breillat, the director of "Romance" ('99), that had, upon it's completion in 1975, caused a ratings scandal in France and, beyond being censored, was banned outright. Tellingly, this year (2000) it finally arrived, with little fanfare, on a screen in Paris as, literally across the street at the MK2 Odeon, another controversial film "Baise-Moi" (2000) was causing riots that led to the film being pulled from cinemas."Une Vraie Jeune Fille" showcases all of the obsessions that mark Breillat's work through to "Romance" and in a way it is almost more interesting to see the film in retrospect, in light of the films that she made after it, as the lietmotifs present in all were not only prefigured in the first film, but this first film also comments on them.A girl returns to her parents house from boarding school for the summer. The situation is stifiling and her father's incestuous desires are more than just suggested, though the girl does little to disuade them. She becomes obsessed with a blue collar employee of her father's and his indifference toward her only increases his presence in her numerous sexual fantasies.The film is visceral and, while the camera is often highly subjective, it maintains, via a cool facade deliberately imitating that of 70's soft porn, that lends it a level of objectivity often entirely absent in American cinema (This film will, incidentally, never reach American screens).In the same way that "Romance" operates, this film, while exploring detailed fantasies, uses its objectivity to resist any psychoanalyzation of its protagonist. It presents only the events, real events merge with fantasy to lend the pornographic journey/discovery a somewhat hallucinatory aspectBreillat has found a niche as a filmmaker her films are cool to the touch without being deconstructive, placing her somwhere between Godard and pornography and as a result her films lack a certain element of humanity that prevent them from transcending this niche.
27 out of 36 people found the following comment useful :- Only for psychosexual drama enthusiasts, 29 December 2004 Author: George Parker from Orange County, CA USA
"A Real Young Girl" is a slice-of-summer-life flick which follows a 17ish school girl's sexual exploration during a summer vacation with her parents on their farm. A brave and visceral character study, this first outing for controversial auteur Catherine Breillat spends 90% of the run examining the fantasies, autoerotic experimentation, and eventual heterosexual encounters of the girl who seems sexually fascinated with all things liquid. Though the film's darkish undercurrents of sexual aberration do portend better things to come from Breillat, it is not particularly interesting as a stand alone piece. Circa 1976 with no apparent remastering, the audio/video quality is poor with color shifts and graininess. Not for those squeamish about graphic sexual content, this film should play best with those interested in psychosexual dramas (B-)
15 out of 16 people found the following comment useful :- Not (as most of Breillat) for the faint-hearted..., 26 July 2003 Author: mireillebelleau from California
*** This comment may contain spoilers ***
**SPOILERS and frank, disturbing details from the film...**This is Breillat's shock value at its extreme. It could honestly be said that with "Une vraie jeune fille" Breillat makes Jon Waters look like Nora Ephron.But the movie's actual point seems to be to explore, with an adolescent aptly named Alice, the advent of a young girl's sexuality on a boring family summer vacation to an arid farm. With no real men interested in her sexually (aside from, it is implied, her father, and a lecherous man his age she meets while at the fair), she turns to her own body for entertainment, inventing bizarre autoerotic games for herself, such as walking home with her underwear around her ankles or placing it on rotting dog carcasses. It is an unflinching look at a young girl's exploration of the female body - her own - mindless of the regard of the other.That said, having first stumbled upon "Une vraie jeune fille" on the "arte" channel the other night in my Paris hotel room, the shock of the images took over any thought processes I was having as to why these visuals were even present and what they represented. There is a scene where the girl's mother unflinchingly saws at a live chicken's neck with a dull kitchen knife, which was obviously not fake (the poor chicken!). In another, Alice puts a bottle of vinegar into her own hind quarters. In one (dream) scene, she writhes tied up on the ground as her love interest tears up an earthworm and places it around (and tries to get it in) her vagina. There are lots more where these came from, but I'm describing these scenes as they are in my mind and not in the "coherent" order in which they appeared in the film, which is unfair to Breillat's intentions. Besides, any further description of the movie might pass as obscene and be edited out of my commentary.The filmmaker herself has been quoted as saying that she wonders if the spectator can make it beyond the shocking images of her works to the emotions and meaning behind them. It is a tough task she asks of us, especially here. While I liked both "Romance" and "36 Fillette" (there is much rapport avec "jeune fille" ) and find Breillat's feminism thought-provoking to say the least, a film like "Une vraie jeune fille" is just too hard for most people to sit through (I haven't brought myself to eat chicken since seeing "jeune fille," and can't get the rest of the images out of my head). Yet through our participation-voyeurism and the heroines' brutal honesty they tell us a certain raw, in-your-face truth about female sexuality. The question is, can we bear to watch long enough to find that truth?
13 out of 15 people found the following comment useful :- The development of a busty French lass..., 28 December 2006 Author: The_Void from Beverley Hills, England
This film is rather difficult to review because it doesn't really have a plot to speak of, and it's clear that director Catherine Breillat was more keen on focusing on the art elements and detailing the sexual developments of a young girl than telling a story. This is the first film I've seen from Catherine Breillat, but given what I've read about her; it would seem that she enjoys directing films that focus on sexuality, and that would seem to be the case if this film is anything to go by. A Real Young Girl focuses on Alice Bonnard, a 'well developed' teenager who attends a boarding school and is spending the summer at her parents' house. She enjoys experimenting, and has a particular fascination with fluids, as she experiments with all sorts including urine and ear wax, as well as egg yolk and tanning cream. She becomes fixated on a man employed by her father, as well as a couple of other local men and her father, and the film basically follows her summer as things happen to her parents and she develops sexually.Unlike most exploitation films, this one takes place from the woman's point of view, although the idea that all men are sex-obsessed perverts certainly shines through, and I wouldn't be surprised to find out that Catherine Breillat is a devout feminist, as there isn't one single decent male character in the whole film. The film rests a lot on its star Charlotte Alexandra, and she doesn't disappoint. Her performance is thoroughly realistic, and she also looks rather tasty, which is sure to delight the male viewers. I have to admit that I was expecting to be shocked going into the film, and while A Real Young Girl is liable to offend less well versed viewers; it would seem I've seen too much of this stuff as nothing in the film seemed too over the top to me. Catherine Breillat clearly isn't afraid to shock the viewers, however, as the film features plenty of nudity and other perverse scenes. The film features no suspense and the plot really just plods along, but it's well paced and while you know that the ending isn't going to provide much intrigue, it doesn't matter as anyone looking for a sexually charged film is likely to be satisfied.
7 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :- Excellent Breillat, 23 July 2006 Author: Tristan Harvey E. White (tristan_white@rocketmail.com) from London, England
Catherine Breillat is an amazing storyteller and director. This is her directorial debut, and we see many topics that will crop up often in her later films - boarding schools (Bilitis), young underage girls on summer holiday wanting to lose their virginity (A ma soeur), underage sex in general (A ma soeur, 36 fillette) anally inserted objects (Anatomie de l'enfer)...I am a fan of Breillat's work, because she is groundbreaking. She does not shy away from risqué material, on the contrary, she courts it. And she makes it terribly sexy as well. Whilst not as good as some of her later stuff, this is excellent storytelling and succeeds where "Bilitis" fails dismally. Perhaps because Breillat was not behind the cameras in "Bilitis", the whole film was very unbelievable. "Une vraie jeune fille" on the other hand is completely believable - even her fantasy of 'Jim' ripping up an earthworm and placing the still wriggling pieces onto her vagina is entirely believable. This is partly thanks to outstanding acting by Charlotte Alexandra in the title role, but also thanks to tasteful direction. Only another woman could enter Alice's psyche in such a deep and meaningful manner. Hats off to Breillat, surely one of the greatest living directors of films not in the English language at this moment in time. Merci beaucoup!
10 out of 15 people found the following comment useful :- Another Sexual Alice, 14 April 2003 Author: tedg (tedg@FilmsFolded.com) from Virginia Beach
Spoilers herein.Although blunt and clumsy, this film transports one -- especially a male -- to a place never visited. That's in part because of the unflinching honesty of the narrative stance; never wavering from the girl's perspective. It it were more familiar territory, like Jane Campion's, it would be a failure -- or if it wavered into observation (like "Claire's Knee") rather than experience.The tone and structure is taken from "Alice in Wonderland:" the episodic shifts into fantasy, the Red Queen, the effete King, the "Jack" (here a lumberjack) the ink, the worm and flies, the tarts, the "tunnel," the focus on song. Alice is a remarkably common metaphoric structure for such visual explorations of sexual angst. I was very impressed with another sexual Alice: "Sex and Lucia" which engaged with the folding of perspectives and realities rather than as here the nearfamiliar strangeness.Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 4: Worth watching.
6 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :- Alice, sweet Alice, 22 January 2007 Author: tsf-1962 from United States
This may well be the definitive teen angst film of all time. I was in love with Alice (Charlotte Alexandra, who bears a striking resemblance to Alicia Silverstone in "The Crush") the moment she began her voice-over narration: "My name is Alice. I hate people. They oppress me." This future existentialist, who in a few years will either be studying phenomonology at the Sorbonne or joining a radical Maoist splinter cell, has every reason to feel oppressed. She is returning home from a truly ghastly summer vacation with her philandering dad and her nagging mom and is well on her way to becoming the next Sylvia Plath. A child trapped in a woman's body, she's obsessed with her vagina and with bodily fluids but understandably shy among men and terrified of real sex. Some of her fantasies and daydreams are quite odd, but hey, this is France, and we're talking about a fourteen-year old, okay? She scandalizes the neighborhood by riding around in her bicycle without any panties and begins a torrid fling with the stud who works at her dad's sawmill (Hyram Keller), which ends in tragedy when he's killed by her father's wild boar trap. The final shot of Alice is chilling. This film goes on to show once again that adolescence is hell, that sex is not all it's cracked out to be, that the French countryside is full of mean, narrow-minded people, and parents don't understand. Those looking for a good porno flick will be understandably disappointed, but those looking for an insightful analysis of modern man (or woman)'s existential ennui will be richly rewarded. This is the film "American Beauty" aspired to be.
15 out of 26 people found the following comment useful :- Crazy; worth seeing, 27 July 2002 Author: poorspider
The film is very unusual at times and its sheer sexuality often gets too heavy. However it is certainly worth seeing, simply for its madness. And for the smoking hot Charlotte Alexandra. She alone is worth the price of admission. Shocking that the film's release was held up until 2000 (25 years later!) due to budgetary problems.
4 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :- A strange mixture of morbidity and eroticism, 21 October 2008 Author: lazarillo
This the first film by notorious French director Catherine Breillat. It was frequently banned back in its day, but I actually found it a lot less disturbing than some of the same director's subsequent efforts (i.e. "36 Fillete", "To My Sister"). The film focuses on an adolescent girl who comes home from boarding school to her parents' isolated country home. There she entertains herself by mercilessly teasing the local male rustics (and even trying to get a rise out of her own father), narcissistically examining her nude body in the mirror, putting silverware down the front of her knickers, and at one point even "buggering" herself with a spray bottle. She eventually becomes obsessed with a young, married employee of her father's, and after a series of increasing bizarre fantasies, sets about trying to ham-handedly seduce him. But this is definitely NOT your average "coming-of-age" story.Both the French and English titles suggests that this is a story about a REAL (as opposed to "really") young girl. And although her behavior and fantasies are pretty bizarre and often surreal, the movie does capture some of perverse, morbid nature of adolescence that many "coming of age" movies avoid. There is an obsession with odors. The girl is fascinated with the smell of her own sex and at one point takes off her panties and puts them on the face of a dead and rotting dog (which she perhaps associates with the same smell of decay). There are also bizarre fantasies involving such unusual, but certainly perverse and morbid, sexual props as earthworms and feathers. The sound of buzzing flies is constantly heard on the soundtrack lending to an oppressive morbid atmosphere of death and decay. Obviously, this movie in many ways is not particularly erotic.In her typical fashion though Breillat has cast a beautiful twenty-something softcore porn actress (Charlotte Alexandra, who also appeared in "Immoral Tales" and "Goodbye, Emanuelle")as the "teenager". This does add some eroticism, but obviously takes away from the realism. It's hard to believe a girl that looks like Alexandra would have difficulty seducing ANYBODY, and she would certainly be surrounded by both male admirers and female friends even in the most godforsaken part of France. Alexandra is surprisingly good in the role, however, and she is fairly convincing as a teenager (at least with her clothes on). At any rate, I'm certainly not going to complain that THIS part wasn't played by an actual fourteen-year-old girl or a less physically attractive actress. It would have made it more "real" I guess, but it also would have been pretty damn hard to watch. As it is, it's a pretty interesting film--a strange mixture of lyrical eroticism and morbid fascination with death and decay.
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