Girlhood

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danwhiffinmusic Excellent coming of age movie set in the Parisian ghettobased around the friendship of a group of black girls struggling to find their way in the world they found themselves. It felt very real, honest and believable to me. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 12/02/23 Full Review Audience Member It risks casting working class or poor black people into very stereotypical, inescapable “fates”, but if you watch it as just one girl’s struggle to deal with everything that society (and her own family) dumps on young girls, it’s actually very well filmed and acted. Rated 3/5 Stars •  Rated 3 out of 5 stars 08/05/22 Full Review Audience Member Marieme is an African-French tennager living in a poor neighbourhood in Paris. As her mother works long hours she has plenty of responsibilities within her household where her older and very strict brother takes the unofficial mantle of head of whilst their mother isn't present. Marieme's academic career has been affected adversely because of her household duties and it is suggested that when she leaves school she takes a vocational course which leaves her disillusioned and despairing. She quickly finds solace and escape under the auspices of a girl gang. With this she appears to come out of her shell more but also sacrifices her true personality so that she can fit in and so a kind of grooming starts with her adopting the ways of the gang as a collective and burying her true self in the process. The gang appears to be the role models and family she always wanted rather than the actual family situation she finds herself in. This is very liberating. But also very dangerous when the will of the collective group take over her individual will. She is even given a new name by the group- Vic which is short for Victory and hew new (and fake) identity is sealed. This film is stunning. It's a tale of coming of age, friendship and how life can hold many unexpected twists and turns. It also shows how some people's futures are so empty and devoid of meaning due to a bleak future that they are enticed by the perceived glamour of a life as a rebel or maverick. But with such a life comes serious consequences that are shown worts and all within the film. With being in a gang there are also rivalries with other gangs to show who is the baddest and most dangerous. This happens in the form of organised fights that are arranged between members of rival gangs with plenty of onlookers cheering and even filming proceedings on their phones. The fights reminded me of some of the fights seen within the TV series Wentworth as they symbolise more than just a winner and a loser but also how they can determine one's status within a much bigger hierarchy. Reject a boring life with soul destroying jobs, lack of prospects and a bleak future. But beware of what you accept in it's place as this may make you vulnerable to other kinds of dangers and place a target on your head. One criticism that director Céline Sciamma received on making this film was that she is a white women telling a story of black women and so her film is somewhat disingenuous and not authentic. This is nonsense and I oppose this criticism just as much as the arguments levelled at certain actors for portraying a character who is within a different demographic to themselves. It's called acting for a reason just as directors can tell stories involving characters with different origins to their own. Look out for the amazing sequence in which the leads mime to Rihanna's Diamonds, not that you would fail to miss such an exquisite moment. But this could be said about the whole of Girlhood. It's a stunning film. Rated 4.5/5 Stars •  Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars 02/19/23 Full Review Audience Member Excellent movie. Highly recommend. I thought it depicted very well the life in some of the suburbs around Paris. Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 01/14/23 Full Review Audience Member A beautiful, brilliant, moving study of a teenage girl in the Paris projects discovering herself, the city, and the complexity of relationships. At times the film is a little self-consciously staged - and this works beautifully as if to emphasise the universal aspects of these very personal experiences. Music is important, punctuating the film at times close to a sense of the musical numbers of musical theatre; in particular is one scene, as the girls dance and sing along to Rhianna's 'Diamonds' in stolen dresses in a hotel room. It's a beautifully conceived, staged and played scene that is allowed to run the length of the song - a moment of care-free self-identification for the girls without the world's prying eyes to shape them into something other. This latter trap is one the central character repeatedly is drawn to and burned by throughout the film, the periodic briefly extended black screens functioning as marker points for something akin to scene changes as she discovers something new, more dangerous or significant than before. The ending manages to combine deep sadness and some kind of grounded hope against the expanse of the city, Marieme's internal struggle for identity continuing to be played out on a scale at once epic and intimate. An essential and masterful film. Rated 4.5/5 Stars •  Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars 02/07/23 Full Review Audience Member Impeccably paced and directed, well shot, and very naturally acted coming-of-age story. Lead Karidja Touré turns in an amazing and impressively nuanced performance. Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 02/12/23 Full Review Read all reviews

Girlhood

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