POVERTY SUCKS, and it’s even worse up close—especially so relentlessly and claustrophobically framed by the shaky hand-held camera of Belgium’s Dardenne brothers. Seventeen-year-old Rosetta (Emilie Dequenne) is poor, painfully so, unable to find a steady job, living in a mobile home, and supporting her debased, alcoholic mother. Yet Rosetta has her pride, tramping through the woods—where she ritually changes her shoes each day—rather than enter the front gates of the despised trailer park. “We’re not beggars,” she screams at her mother. She’s a survivor, a scavenger who forages like an animal, fishing in ponds, selling used clothing in shops—always driving a hard bargain.
Rosetta
written and directed by Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne
runs December 10-16 at Egyptian
Best known here for La Promesse (on many 1996 10-best lists), the Dardennes are maddening purists in their technique, making Rosetta a tough film to sit through. The banal details of Rosetta’s life are rendered episodically (many in real time), with no recognizable plot. We see her tying her shoes, baiting her hooks, and mixing flour to the point of tedium. (And forget about a soundtrack.) The picture won top honors at Cannes this year—seemingly damning it as One of Those Movies Only the French Could Love.
But wait. Have patience. Something remarkable happens in Rosetta as its protagonist is stretched to the breaking point and beyond. Her mother disappears on a bender, but Rosetta gets a job. She’s befriended by a kind boy (Fabrizio Rongione) at a waffle cart—don’t laugh; waffles figure prominently here—who makes her dinner and woos her with comic ineptitude. Curled up chastely on his couch, she tries to reassure herself that things have changed. “You have a friend,” she tells herself. “You found a job. You have a normal life.” It’s a heartbreaking moment that crystallizes Rosetta‘s raw, emotional immediacy.
Then, frantic to retain her newfound independence, Rosetta commits a horrible deed—apparently without remorse. We’re shocked, yet she continues her seemingly imperturbable routine with the same sheer willpower; she’ll do what she must to survive.
The Dardennes owe a bit to Truffaut, and Rosetta deserves comparison to The Four Hundred Blows in its depiction of the limited, single-minded perspective of youth. Their heroine is wounded and flawed, yet utterly memorable. And in Rosetta‘s astonishing final scenes, she proves herself to be a moralist as uncompromising as her creators.
