Kid With A Bike

“The Kid With A Bike”

Written and Directed by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne; starring Cécile de France, Thomas Doret, Jérémie Renier; 2012

“The Kid With A Bike” is constructed in a charmless and frugal manner.  The cinematography and look of the film is casual to a fault.  There are very few close-ups and little intercutting.  Medium range continuous takes are often used to record what is happening in front of the camera.  Medium continuous takes can be very effective sometimes (Woody Allen’s films) but the medium continuous takes in “The Kid With A Bike” seem like a default position, rather than a specific artistic choice.  The narrative takes huge leaps as if the screenwriters forgot to write some of the story and the director was left with nothing to do.  In this case the writer/directors are Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, and they lacked an outside eye to say there are some huge narrative holes in the story.

For instance, Joanna, a stranger, decides to take Cyril on weekends as a foster child.  There is no reason given, nor do we see Joanna do anything to decide to do this.  Suddenly, with no rationale or transitional scenes she loads Cyril and his bike into her car and off they go.

Cecile de France played Joanna.  Her performance was flat and uninvolved.  Most of the actors appeared uninterested in their characters and uninterested in the film.

Cyril and Joanna don’t connect emotionally and they don’t even seem to like each other.  She takes no interest in him and acts completely bored in his presence.  There is no indication from either of them that they like or need each other, or that a friendship could develop.  They are both emotionally vacant as are all of the other characters in the film.  It’s hard to get involved in a story that is empty of emotion.

The narrative strategy is purposefully anti-motivation.  The characters make willy-nilly life choices and do things for no apparent reason.  This strategy is not successful enough to raise the film to a level of an artistic or philosophical statement.   It simply appears inadequate.

Why does Joanna take in Cyril as a foster child?  Why doesn’t his father want Cyril?  Why does Cyril stab Joanna?  These are just some of the unanswered and hard to understand issues that make it hard to engage in the story.

The story plows ahead with artistic determination like the makers granted themselves permission to do away with organic story development and replace it with contrived events.  This forcefulness makes the viewer an detached observer.

With a title like “The Kid With a Bike” I had high hopes.  I was kept at a distance however, both emotionally and intellectually.  I admire the themes and content and hope for the best as the film unfolds.  But ultimately I was denied access to the heart and soul of the characters and of the film.

“The Kid With a Bike” was almost a good film.  It felt and looked more like an exercise or an experiment that didn’t quite succeed.