As its director, Charlène Favier, recalled, during the many festivals where Slalom has been selected and rewarded around the world, finding funding has been an obstacle course. Indeed, for her first feature film, the producer and director wanted to tackle sexual violence in the world of sport at the dawn of numerous recent surveys and the awareness of institutions. Slalom sounds like a standard-bearer of this freedom of speech but it is not only that.
An aesthetic proposal that embraces adolescence
Slalom / Charlie Bus Production ©
Slalom / Charlie Bus Production ©Although having as its main subject the hold of a coach, played by a convincing Jérémie Renier , on his young recruit, Slalom transposes to the screen a teenager and totally marries her psyche at the crossroads of emotions that this period can arouse in a young girl, here Lyz interpreted by the mesmerizing Noée Abita. The filmmaker, before dealing with sexual violence, first deals with her character in constant search of thrills through her practice of sport and, more intimately, her identity. Charlene Favier makes the remarkable choice to give life to her character and characterize him through staging, light and colors. In this, Slalom is a true cinema proposal exploiting the environment surrounding Lyz to highlight its ills. It is easy to understand that he seduced many juries of festivals in which he competed. Dealing with Lyz's adolescence and fragility, Slalom also depicts her mother's isolation and abandonment that will only tighten the grip of the toxic and abusive relationship between her and her coach. The attachment and the grip gradually settling until an intolerable and dangerous act, filmed with brutal coldness, dispossessing the girl of her own body, body itself constantly tested through the ever more trying training. Slalom will prove to be a visually admirable film but also harsh and scathing for a result full of nuances.
Visual sensitivity at the service of a realistic narrative
Slalom / Charlie Bus Production ©
Slalom / Charlie Bus Production ©Slalom can be blamed for the lack of originality of its scenario. Nevertheless, it would be to overshadow the surprising work brought into the staging and photography making the film intense. Charlène Favier, and her director of photography Yann Maritaud, have done a careful and singular job exploiting the frame as a breeding ground for the psychology of the character, her femininity and her body. The mountains of Savoie, an underexploited region in the filmmaker's own words, are filmed with accuracy in response to what the young teenager lives as the film progresses, always in a sensory way at the heart of her sensitivity. Skiing is also exploited, not being simply a gadget but a means of defining the plurality of disorders and aspirations of the girl in search of herself, reconstruction and destruction. In short, Slalom is a surprising first film revealing a filmmaker with a masterful direction to evoke a sensitive and very current subject carried by a remarkable actress. Two careers full of promise that we will follow closely.
