Written by Linda
February 14, 2009
Having just recently seen The 400 Blows, the classic French New Wave film about the every-day life of an adolescent boy in Paris, I couldn’t help but notice that Set Me Free was, in a way, a bit of an homage to that film (there is even a “pawn the typewriter” scene).
However, despite the fact that coming-of-age films have since become a prolific genre, I found Set Me Free to be a refreshing change because in this case it was an adolescent girl in the center of the story. And what a find is young actress Karine Vanasse! She is fantastic, playing our heroine 13-year-old Hanna in early 1960s Montreal, Canada.
We follow a year in Hanna’s life, from summer holiday to summer holiday, and all that falls in between. Her home life is unstable: her Holocaust-survivor father (Miki Manojlovic) is an unsuccessful writer, and her mother (Pascale Bussières) has become so beaten down and removed from everyday life that she is distant and suicidal. Somehow, Hanna and her older teenage brother still seem to live carefree lives of those just on the edge of adult responsibility. The siblings are so close that they even develop and share a relationship with a girl they are both attracted to.
The character of Hanna is wonderful and complex. Karine Vanasse effortlessly conveys a range of emotions, from subtle to extreme, yet is so good that it looks effortless. She becomes enraptured of the heroine of the film Vivre sa vie, a prostitute played by Anna Karina who takes responsibility for her own life, but is ultimately defeated in the end by her choices. Hanna, in the discovery and questioning of adolescence, tries to live her life in the spirit of the film, and discovers on occasion that reality doesn’t live up to fantasy. The moments of Hanna desperately trying to communicate with her distant mother whom she adores are particularly wrenching and well-done. You can literally see on Vanasse’s face the change from dependent child to exhausted caretaker as she tries to keep her mother from physically and emotionally slipping away.
Set Me Free, with its slow pacing and lack of any sort of central plot will definitely make some viewers restless who prefer action movies, but it proves to be a rewarding film for fans of well-acted drama and art-house films. I highly recommended this film!
