L’enfant (The Child)
Belgium, 2005, 95'
Bruno and Sonia are in love. They live day by day, but something changes when little Johnny is born. While the approach to life of the part of the girl, transported by the love for her child, begins to change, the young father only sees him as something transient, whom you don’t need to cope with. And when he understands that he cannot make money out of him, he doesn’t hesitate to leave him in the spires of illegal adoption. Sonia’s inevitable desperate reaction will at last lead Bruno to some soul searching.
Second Palme d’or for the Dardenne brothers, who with this film perform a new style transformation with respect to the previous, letting their characters ‘breathe’ and working more on the space determined by a couple of main characters. From the ethical questioning of the early shorts, exploration of the characters’ inner world , they reach a morality play in which the figures of the two teenagers, now parents, are like a simulacrum of how much love is left in a world that has forgotten solidarity and brotherhood in which money is the only currency. Outspokenly inspired by Bresson’s masterpieces, from Pickpocket to L’argent, The Child is destined to remain a milestone in the cinema of the two directors.
Local Time
- Timezone: America/New_York
- Date: 08 Nov 2022
- Time: 15:00
Location
- Cinema Stensen - Viale Don Giovanni Minzoni, 25c, 50129 Florence
Organizer
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Jean-Pierre e Luc Dardenne
Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne are Belgian directors, screenwriters and producers. After studying drama, Jean-Pierre, and philosophy, Luc, the Dardenne brothers shot their first militant works, filming social struggles in Belgian working-class neighbourhoods. In the late 1970s, they founded film production companies and made their first documentary films, including Lorsque le bateau de Léon M. descendit la Meuse pour la première fois (1979), Pour que la guerre s'achève, les murs devaient s'écrouter (1980), R... ne répond plus (1981), Leçons d'une université volante (1982) and Regard Jonathan/Jean Louvet, 231 (1983). In 1996 their third fiction film, La Promesse, was presented at the Directors' Fortnight in Cannes, but it was not until 1999 that they gained international recognition with their first Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival with the film Rosetta. In 2005 they won their second Palme d'Or with L'Enfant - A Love Story and in 2008 The Silence of Lorna, dedicated to the theme of illegal immigration and white marriage, brought them the Best Screenplay Award at the Cannes Film Festival. Among their most recent works, The Kid with a Bike won the Special Jury Grand Prix at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival, and Tori and Lokita, Special Prize at the Cannes Film Festival 2022.
