Boy gets bike, boy loses bike, boy gets bike back...

"Kid With a Bike" was the subject of last evening's CineVerse dissection. And the film proved to be a simple yet powerful exploration of a pre-teen's troubled life, minus all the sentimentality and emotional ham-fistedness that normally accompanies movies about youth in crisis. Lessons learned about "Kid With a Bike" include:

WHAT DID YOU FIND INTRIGUING, CURIOUS, OR SATISFYING ABOUT “KID WITH A BIKE”?

·         It’s a tale that begins “in medias res,” which means in the middle of the action/plot, without a prologue or preamble.

·         It feels like it’s constantly moving, thanks to mobile handheld camera work that has us following the boy and seeing things from his point of view throughout the movie (and we have to keep up with him, as he is ever walking, running, biking, moving); it also has a kinetic editing style and a tightly written story; there’s arguably no “fat” here or scenes that don’t move the story or the characters forward.

·         We aren’t given much backstory or psychological motivations/explanations for why characters think, act and feel the way they do. Nothing is explained, for example, as to why Samantha wants to become a surrogate mom-of-sorts to Cyril, or how/why Cyril’s mother has disappeared.

o   This is in keeping with the Dardenne brothers’ penchant for keeping sentimentality and melodrama out of their films. They want viewers to come to their own conclusions without resorting to sappy emotional manipulation, romanticized dialogue or tug-on-your-heartstrings-style storytelling.

o   In this way, the filmmakers are more concerned with living in the now, as opposed to dwelling on the past via flashbacks, expository dialogue, or revealing information that could explain motives or thought-processes.

·         The boy is exposed to tough, streetwise elements like the drug addict, yet the filmmakers chose to refrain from using profanity in their vernacular.

·         This film also differs from the Dardenne brothers’ earlier works, which were typically bleaker and less redemptive and which featured no music, unlike this movie. However, this film is similar to their previous ones in that it’s set primarily on the streets of Seraing, Belgium, shot in a “fluent yet functional realist style, with an often highly mobile camera, and lasting around ninety minutes,” according to Criterion Collection essayist Geoff Andrew.

·         The conclusion is quite open-ended without any clear resolution; it ends abruptly, and we aren’t sure if this boy will straighten up and fly right, but it’s a hopeful sign that he walks away, without resentment or retribution, from an antagonist at the finale.

KID WITH A BIKE HAS BEEN DESCRIBED BY THE FILMMAKERS AND OTHERS AS A FAIRTALE-LIKE STORY AND FILM. WHAT IS THE EVIDENCE OF THIS?

·         We have a lost boy who, like so many young protagonists in animated Disney films, is:

o   Parentless, abandoned or far from home (Cinderella, Snow White, Lion King, Peter Pan)

o   on a quest to retrieve or redeem something

o   falls under the spell of a bad influence (Sleeping Beauty, Pinocchio)

o   gets lost in the scary forest (Snow White, Beauty and the Beast)

o   has a fairy godmother of sorts watching over him (Cinderella)

HOW IS “KID WITH A BIKE” SIMILAR TO AND DIFFERENT FROM “THE BICYCLE THIEF”?

·         This is imbued with a modernistic sense of realism in the way it’s shot (handheld camera, fast-paced editing style); Bicycle Thief was considered a masterpiece of the neo-realism movement. Both films are shot on location in the actual settings their stories are based in, giving them a realism and documentary-like feel.

·         However, in the older film, the boy has a father but must hunt for his lost bike; in this picture, the boy has a bike but must hunt for his father.

OTHER FILMS OR STORIES THIS MOVIE REMINDS YOU OF

·         The Bicycle Thief

·         Night of the Hunter

·         Oliver Twist

·         Snow White

·         The 400 Blows

OTHER FILMS BY JEAN-PIERRE AND LUC DARDENNE:

·         Le Fils (The Son)

·         L’Enfant (The Child)

·         The Silence of Lorna

·         Two Days One Night