Following her critically acclaimed All Is Forgiven and The Father of My Children, Cahiers du Cinma critic turned filmmaker
Mia Hansen-Lve offers the awkwardly titled Goodbye First Love. An exploration of budding young sexuality and attendant affairs of the heart, the film reveals little insight into these aspects of the human condition, yet it does reflect the anguish associated with the intensity of ones first romance in an almost two-hour exploration of timeless emotions amid an exquisitely rendered portrait of todays France.
Its tempting to dog a critics filmic endeavors, or at least hold them to a higher standard, and fortunately Hansen-Lves
films meet any rigorous test of art in cinema. Even so, Goodbye First Love initially seems a bit Victorian and prudish for a contemporary French film. The sex scenes are
not intense (although, merci dieu, theres no sexy music in the background, or soft focus), yet they are intimate and sensuous. These scenes may be problematic for the American viewer, particularly since the teen lovers (Sebastian Urzendowsky, Lola Crton) are supposed to be 15 years old. We feel, well, guilty being turned on by the hot bodies in motion, all heaving breasts and butts. Nevertheless, there are no Larry Clark creepy moments happening here, and most likely these actors are over 18. Interestingly, the age of consent in France is 15. Guilt is a social construct.
Another issue permeating contemporary cinema compellingly attractive leads chosen for looks over talent
thankfully is not evident here, as the handsome lead actors work is naturalistic and at times profoundly moving. Lola Crton as Camille becomes a dominant force
in her own life after deep romantic sorrow, propelled by heartbreak to excel through intense study in architecture. In fact, the third lead in this film is architecture itself,
from the hermetic yet homey Parisian flats to the rehabilitation of a mid-century Bauhausian asylum to the rustic stone country houses of the Loire Valley; a field trip to
Dessau to view and study the Bauhaus campus is as lovingly portrayed as is the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art in Ferris Buellers Day Off.
As a tribute to the art of architecture, the films analogy of human relationships being constructed and deconstructed, decaying and being reborn is unavoidable. The buildings lend a viscerally permeating mood of human ephemerality amid the permanence of nature. The staid stone homes of the Ardche surrounded by fields of weeds and wildflowers seem one with nature, infused with the incessant humming of insects as a soundtrack, stone relics of a long gone past. An Alexander Calder sculpture garden sprouts from the weeds, silent guardians of a Fauvist scenario. Symbolism is everywhere, as when the young lovers actually exchange cherries picked fresh off the tree. The continued reference of a straw hat becomes a symbol of enveloping shelter from the elements (water is everywhere, from tears to rain to rivers to drain spouts) and as tangible nostalgic allusion.
If you have seen Hansen-Lves All Is Forgiven and The Father of My Children, see Goodbye First Love as part of a
trilogy with the bonding thematic elements of separation, solitude, destiny and emotional resonance. If Goodbye is your first encounter with the work of Mia Hansen-Lve, it will serve as a fine introduction indeed.
Roy Rogers Oldenkamp
