Suzanne (12A)

Directed by Katell Quillevere

4 Stars

After Love Like Poison, French film-maker Katell Quillevere returns with another story of love, life and death.

In it, a lorry driver (Francois Damiens) is widowed and left with two daughters. He does his best to raise his girls and give them a happy childhood but while Maria (Fanie Zanini) is well-behaved, Suzanne (Sara Forestier) is reckless and hot tempered. She is just 17 when she becomes pregnant.

A few years later, Suzanne embarks upon a crazy love affair with Nicolas (Paul Hamy), who eventually turns to a life of thuggery. Abandoning her family, she runs away with him but ends up in jail.

Quillevere doesn't simply focus on the fugitive young couple. We learn about those left behind and their daily and unspectacular lives - Suzanne's father turns out to be an honest man who sells his lorry to get his daughter out of jail and her sister is always there to stand up for Suzanne.

A film about people making their own destiny, the complex and fascinating female protagonist is torn between the need to belong to a family and the desire to escape it.

Suzanne desperately seeks to find something to make her feel alive but that also puts her in danger and, inevitably, makes her suffer. Her bitter adolescence as a neglected, somewhat hapless juvenile delinquent brings to mind classics of French cinema like Francois Truffaut's 400 Blows.

Rita di Santo