Review of Forbidden games (2015) by Nicola J — 22 Jul 2007

All right, here it is, ladies and gents: the only film I've ever cried at. It's a sad story on the surface, as a five-year-old girl, left orphaned after the brutal deaths of her parents by air fire, seeks out shelter, accompanied by the body or her beloved dead dog.

She meets a country boy a few years older, and both form a bond made out of morbid fascination with the deaths of animals, while in the midst of deaths of mass, war-stricken citizens and soldiers surrounding them.

A film with a distinctly Italian neo-realist bent, but also an emphasis on the aloofness of childhood, unequivocally French, contrasting the seemingly "cultured" and "level-headed" actions of the utterly inept adults around them.

Thus, the film succeeds in illustrating the futility of adulthood while also painfully showing the foolishness of war -- all while these children grieve over dead animals! No wonder this thing is a sob-fest.

But we don't end up crying for the ultimate fates of these characters, even though they are wholly dependent children; we cry for humanity, as the misunderstandings of civilization amount to nothing more than bloodshed and tears.

Maybe I read too much into it, but obviously "Forbidden Games" affected me in a way no other film has. A surprisingly funny film at times, very sweet, endearing, but nonetheless tragic from the very opening moments, and we know it immediately.

The acting is astonishingly natural, and the famous guitar score by Narciso Yepes is beautiful. One of the great French classics, heartbreaking and unmissable.