Dir.
Julie Gavras, Italy/France, 2006, 99 mins, French with subtitles
Cast: Nina Kervel-Bey, Julie Depardieu, Stefano Accorsi, Benjamin Feuillet, Martine Chevalier
Review by Richard Beaumont
There is no perspective quite as simple, yet overly complicated than one from a nine-year-old child. Blame it on Fidel is a wonderful story involving a middle class family who undergo dramatic political and social changes due to the parents' sudden birth of morality.
The unique aspect to this feature is that the entire film is based on the observations of Anna (Kerve-Bey), the daughter of journalist Marie (Depardieu), and her husband Fernando (Accorsi), a lawyer. Anna and her younger brother Francois (Feuillet)are quite content with their middle class life style, with a substantial sized house and a nanny to whom they are familiar. However, the introduction of Fernando’s sister and her daughter to the family, after being forced to depart from Spain for political reasons, causes a spiral of events and changes to their secure way of life.
Due to his sisters circumstances Fernando’s new found beliefs are born and proceed at a vast pace, with immediate alterations to his family’s social well being. They move from their adequate sized house to a smaller flat in which Anna now has to share her bedroom with her brother. Their nanny is also replaced by a number of different women, whom all present a different cuisine to which Anna has trouble accepting and adjusting to. As well as the materialistic adjustments, her parents associates have completely changed also, filling the small apartment in the evenings with ideas, discussions and cigarette smoke.
Anna’s parents new found conversion to communism forces her to participate, on the odd occasion, in various modes of political business. She is forced to partake in a protest march, which turns slightly sour with the involvement of the police, who begin to fire tear gas amongst the protesters, to which the aligned marchers scurry in a panicked state. Anna is left, standing alone amidst the gas, staring ahead, scared yet curious of the circumstances, until her father returns and leads her to safety.
Anna, an already very observant child, now spends the majority of her time studying the alien people around her, with their strange attire and astonishing facial hair. The methods and meanings behind her parents actions are explained to her, and although confused, she tries to understand, even to the point of attempting group solidity within her social life. This is shown in a very light hearted and humorous manner, but only leaves her even more confused, resulting in numerous additional questions.
Although Anna has great difficulty in adjusting to her new life style, her younger brother, innocent and unaware of the true meaning behind the social transformation, simply gets on with his life, without a moments pondering. The sweetness of the character of Francois is highlighted in the scene involving Anna’s friend from school visiting their apartment. She promptly points out how small and strange their new home is to which Francois quickly defends their new way of living. His optimistic approach amends Anna’s own way of thinking and she slowly begins to become comfortable, knowing that it will make her parents happy.
Blame it on Fidel has to be one of the most simple yet powerful films released this year, with superb performances throughout, in particular the young leads. Director Julie Gavras has captured the essence of the film perfectly, portraying the seriousness of their situation in a very light hearted, playful way. Particular shots are very indicative of Anna’s situation, expressing her difficulty to see the grown up, blurry world clearly. Though Anna struggles to make sense of it all, one thing is crystal clear - even grown ups are unsure at times.
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