Falcon Lake

Es ist die ewig junge Geschichte der erwachenden Sexualität von Teenagern: Der 13-jährige Bastien verbringt die Ferien am Falcon Lake in der Provinz Québec und fühlt sich stark zur 16-jährigen Chloé, Tochter eines Freundespaares seiner Eltern, hingezogen. Der jedoch ist dies, zumindest am Anfang, überaus gleichgültig, weil es erwachsenere Alternativen gibt. Doch bald dreht sich die Situation. Wie die Regisseurin vermittels kleiner Gesten – so die zarten Berührungen der Hände, die wie choreografiert wirken – die steigende Spannung plausibel werden lässt und dabei die umgebende dramatische Naturkulisse als Kontrastfolie einbezieht – das ist schon große Klasse. (Thomas Mießgang)

Bastien is a French boy on the brink of adolescence who is spending his vacation with his family in a cottage on the shores of Falcon Lake, Canada. He is shy, terribly bored and a bit lost. The lake is allegedly haunted by the ghost of a boy, and Bastien eagerly explores the place to find traces of the spirit. When Chloe, who is a few years older, arrives to spend some time with her family, Bastien’s summer takes a different direction. In this world where parents and children live separately under the same roof, the protagonists play hide and seek with each other until the spirit of the lake arises.
Even though this could be the plot of hundreds of films, few have been able to grasp the melancholy and solitude of a kid saying goodbye to his childhood. The warmth of the summer days and their slow tempo are impressively filmed in vivid colors on rich 16mm film stock. And if the awkwardness of the first attempts at romance is narrated with the same modesty as that of her protagonist, Charlotte Le Bon’s emphatic gaze brings all the oddities of that age to the screen with laughter and sensuality. (Rebecca De Pas)

Charlotte Le Bon: JUDITH HOTEL (2018, K)