Claire Simon Movies

A self-absorbed adolescent girl forms an unhealthy fixation on a handsome volunteer fireman in director Claire Simon's emotional teen drama. Livia (Camille Varene) is a fifteen year-old girl who lives in the south of France with her divorced mother. As the summer heat begins to radiate Livia spends most of her days trotting around the small Provençal town atop a horse from her father's farm. A frequent target of ridicule amongst her peers, Livia's horse emboldens her with a sense of superiority that she just can't seem to achieve in the classroom. When her father comes to claim the horse and Livia is forced to face her tormentors eye to eye, she begins to turn her attentions increasingly towards happily married husband and father Jean. A kind volunteer fireman who treats Livia with a respect rarely afforded to the girl by her peers, Jean may be old enough to be Livia's father though a strange attraction begins to develop between the pair. Later, as the young girl's infatuation with the firefighter begins to grow and she casts aside her inhibitions to pursue him romantically at any cost, the relationship shared between Livia and Jean threatens to take a tragic turn. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Based on a true story this emotionally wrenching character study focuses upon a desperate young wife who feigns an entire pregnancy in hopes of convincing her dissatisfied husband to remain with her. Magali's problem comes from the fact that she is so bland and unassuming as to be nearly invisible. Her passivity and inability to form her own opinions grates on her husband Alain, a go-getter radio journalist, and he plans to take a year long assignment in Canada to get away from her. While preparing to leave, his boss, who has been inadvertently led to believe that Magli is pregnant, shows up and tells Alain. The husband's first response is to demand an abortion, but on second thought he decides he would like to become a father after all. Magli, fearing that he will leave, then devises her elaborate ruse. The gravity of her deception increases with that of her pillow-padded abdomen, for when her terminally ill father learns of her fecund condition, he vows that he will remain alive long enough to see his grandbaby. Her sister-in-law, who opted for abortion, is also very supportive and determined to help her through the pregnancy. As the months pass, Magli becomes increasingly cagey and cannily does not give Alain a definite due date. In the end, she solves her problem in a most creative way; it is a solution that spawns surprising consequences. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

This forgettable, low-budget drama finds a violin teacher visiting his childhood friend and his wife at his country home in August of 1964. Talking heads deliver the trite dialogue that is unintentionally funny and seems to have been made up as the film was rolling. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide