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Les Cowboys. A tough but magnificent film
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Thomas Bidegain, who debuts as director in this film, is a great fan of "The Searchers" by John Ford. Perhaps for this reason, the first scenes of this remake look like a western: in an eastern French meadow, some people are celebrating a country party. In the background, we hear a song whose lyrics talk about sentimental losses. A father starts a dance with her teenage daughter under the complacent gaze of the mother. Soon this initial happiness is shattered by the disappearance of the girl. The research parents carry out leads to the conclusion that her daughter has a Muslim boyfriend. Given the ineptitude of the police to trace the teenager, the father decides to start the search on his own.
Accompanied by his son, he embarks on a long journey where they both will follow clues, sometimes false and sometimes without any result. They will risk their lives meeting dangerous people in dangerous places until an accident ends the search. The father has sacrificed everything for finding her daughter and the director, with subtle and accurate shots, strikes the audience which identifies with the character in his agonizing pain.
The son, who is willing to sacrifice his youth, decides to continue the pursuit of his sister, and Thomas Bidegain presents us his desolation and helplessness while, through flashbacks on a TV screen, we see the attacks on the Twin Towers in New York, Madrid, and London. We will also identify with him in the exceptional and bitter final scene.
Without proposing solutions or politicizing the situation, the director talks about this society where we live, in a complex and globalized world sometimes difficult to understand. Bidegain has managed to capture an uncomfortable subject, avoiding a Manichean vision, keeping the audience in suspense and giving a human perspective on the complexity of life. It should be noted that the film is produced by the Dardenne brothers, and it has a magnificent performance of the character of the father by François Damiens.
Texts: Núria Farré. facebook@cinemaperaestudiants.cat
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