52 Films by Women Vol 2. 43. PRIMAIRE (Elementary) (Director: Hélène Angel)
A director’s past work is no indication of what they might
produce. This is abundantly true of Primaire
(Elementary) directed by Hélène
Angel from a screenplay she wrote with Yann Coridian, Olivier Gorce and Agnès
De Sacy. Set in Grenoble in France, a city in south-eastern France close to the
French Alps, it describes the struggle to a young primary school teacher,
Florence (Sara Forestier, redefined by this movie) to balance life and work. Both
are thrown out of whack by two events. Her ex-husband wants their ten-year-old son
Denis (Albert Cousi) to travel with him to Asia. Then a troubled kid, Sacha (Ghillas
Bendjoudi) abandoned by her mother ends up having a fixation of her. Throw in a
class inspection, a pupil who struggles with reading, Greek myth, a difficulty
with the special needs assistant who is coaxing one pupil a little too much and
an Oriental food delivery guy, and there is a super abundance of incident to
keep viewers absorbed over the film’s 105-minute running time. Believe me -
you’ll stay to the very end just to enjoy the closing, uplifting song.
So who is Hélène Angel? Born on 3 May 1967, she came to
prominence with her 1999 directorial debut, Skin
of Man, Heart of Beast (Peau d´homme, coeur de bête), an acclaimed but little
seen drama about Coco (Bernard Blancan) who returns home with a dubious
story about having been in the foreign legion but then behaves erratically. She
followed it in 2003 with Rencontre avec
le dragon, a larger-budgeted medieval adventure film starring Daniel
Auteuil in heavy armour as an immortal knight scarred by fire. She co-wrote the
screenplay of Sister Welsh’s Nights,
released in 2010 before helming the 2011 thriller Propriété Interdite (Forbidden House) about a bourgeois couple,
Claire (Valérie Bonneton) and Benoit (Charles Berling) who return to the
dilapidated family home where Claire grew up to discover that the house might
be occupied. Most of her work as a director deals with troubled or literally
scarred men, but there is also a sub-theme in three of her films (Skin of Man, Rencontre avec le dragon and Primaire)
about the relationships between adults and pre-pubescent children.
The tone of Primaire
is lighter than Angel’s previous work and is her first to primarily focus on a
female protagonist. We first see Florence attempting to get young Tara (Tara
Dechaud) to read the word ‘Aventure’ (adventure) syllable by syllable, whilst
two boys, Lamine (Lamine Mara) and Timothée (Timothée Fournier) also in the
classroom hurl insults. Incidentally, many of the child cast share their
character’s first names, which must have made it easier for Forestier to play
teacher. Tara struggles. Florence doesn’t just teach at the school, she lives
there. She isn’t just a mother. Her son Denis is also in her class. Her world
is complete but small: 20 to 30 children, the school administration. She has textbooks
in her kitchen. No boundaries.
Denis is more than a little embarrassed by his mom. She
showers him with kisses and endearments that even an eight-year-old might baulk
at. Denis wants to be with his father, to travel. That would mean disrupting
his schooling and Florence being on her own.
Florence is really tested when Sacha is brought into her
class. He doesn’t have his sports kit. He looks older, broader, more physically
imposing than the other children. Denis complains that he smells and moves away
from him. Sacha has been given money but has no clean laundry. His mother has
disappeared. Eventually, the school contacts Sacha’s mother’s ex-boyfriend,
Mathieu (Vincent Elbaz), a delivery man whose job doesn’t allow him to care for
Sacha full time.
One day, Sacha isn’t collected from school and is taken into
Florence’s flat. He roots around the house and steals a scarf. He teases and
fights with Denis. The two boys end up in a classroom and end up spray painting
one class’s pet rabbit. The rabbit then escapes (wouldn’t you?).
A relationship grows between Florence and Mathieu after she
covers him with pancake mix in her apartment; he remarks on the books in her
kitchen. Florence isn’t looking for romance but she wants Sacha’s mother to
take responsibility for him. One of the film’s best scenes has Florence
confront the woman in the clothes shop where she works. She is emotionally
closed and is in no mental state to care for another human being. Sacha’s
mother offers Florence a scarf which comforted Sacha when he was younger; it is
only the slightest recognition that she cares.
At one low point, Florence leaves the school building and
goes for a walk in the evening haze. She sits high above the city with a
troubled look on her face. The panorama is stunning. We realize that the
majority of the film is set in interiors. This scene represents release. On her
way back, somewhat cleanses by the clear air, Florence catches sight of the
painted rabbit.
The film has something to say about modern primary school
education in France. Teachers complain about a focus on ‘pupil production’.
Florence doesn’t teach Christian or Islamic religion; the school’s show focuses
instead on Greek mythology, which doesn’t have tied to it a code of conduct to
be followed in the 21st Century. In freeing young minds, it is
important to teach facts and stories that don’t determine how one should
behave, not to assign gender roles – so girls as well as boys can use (toy)
weapons – and the children can pick their own parts. It makes for an
interesting alternative to teaching in the United Kingdom and America, which
introduces children to religion at a young age.
There are other testing moments for Florence, when a parent
accuses her of giving a girl a role that reflects her learning difficulties.
When the school inspector sits in her class, Florence asks the class to
calculate the numbers of dictations that she has given in her career so far and
how many she might give before she retires – the children are very competent at
maths, but the inspector asks if Florence might like to take a break. There is
also a moment of vindication: Tara being left to wander alone and reading all
the school notices. Education is liberation.
Some reviews have criticised the film for being preachy,
confusing the setting with the drama itself. Primaire isn’t didactic. Yes, it is about education giving young
children confidence to discover the world on their own (or with Papa) and about
persistence and self-belief (Florence assures Tara that all her children learn
to read). But it has one scene that is far from preachy, when the special needs
assistant visits the child that she formerly supported and is barely
recognised. There is the heartbreaking implication that teachers are sometimes
invisible, present but not seen.
I don’t know who rates films on imdb but ‘6.6 out of 10’ for
Primaire seems awfully harsh. ‘10 out
of 10’ is nearer the mark - I was knocked out by it.
Reviewed at Cine
Lumiere, South Kensington, London, Friday 8 September 2017, 20:40 screening
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