LAST SUMMER (2024) - Mark Reviews Movies

Last Summer, Sideshow / Janus Films

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Review by Mark Dujsik | June 27, 2024

Not simply a remake, writer/director Catherine Breillat's Last Summer draws its own conclusions from the scenario established by the 2019 Danish film Queen of Hearts. That film was unsettling in a specific way, revolving around a character who behaves badly—immorally and illegally—and acts just as terribly, if not worse, to cover up what she has done. This version is disturbing in the same way, although the reconfigured third act sees the problem as being bigger than just one person.

The setup remains almost exactly the same in Breillat's screenplay (written in collaboration with Pascal Bonitzer), although the story is transferred to France. In it, Anne (Léa Drucker) is a successful attorney who works on cases of violence and abuse against girls and young women. She's married to a finance man named Pierre (Olivier Rabourdin), his second marriage, and the couple is raising two young girls (They're adopted in this variation, on account of a change to Anne's back story).

Pierre receives a call from his ex-wife in Switzerland, who doesn't know what to do anymore about their teenage son. The boy got into a violent confrontation with a teacher, which resulted in the teen's arrest, and the parents decide that their son should move in with his father and stepmother for at least the summer for a change of scenery and, perhaps, for Pierre's influence to have some effect on the boy.

Théo (Samuel Kircher), the teenager, remains a bit of a problem child, though. He's spoiled, leaving behind clothes and dishes and trash for Anne to clean. He spends most of his days in his room playing video games or watching TV shows on his phone. With Pierre often absent for his job, Anne becomes the teen's caretaker, whenever she isn't busy with her own work, and is treated as mostly invisible by her stepson.

There are some bright spots. Théo is a loving and attentive older brother to his stepsisters (played by Serena Hu and Angela Chen), who quickly adore him, and Anne and her stepson have something of a breakthrough, albeit by Théo's dishonesty. One day, Anne comes home with her sister Mina (Clotilde Courau), who miserably works in a hair salon and is raising a young son with little help from an unreliable ex, to find the family mansion ransacked. When Anne discovers something from her stolen purse in Théo's laundry, she makes a deal with the kid: She won't tell his father, as long as he starts acting like a part of the family.

It works. From there, Anne and Théo start to become closer—too close, if a trip to a bar for some frank discussions is any indication, and, eventually, even closer than that.

Those who know the original film already know what this means, and even the unfamiliar probably have a tingle of some discomfort suspecting what that could mean. Like the preceding film, this one is meant to be confrontational and disturbing, showing how Anne crosses one line and then another and then past the point of no return with her teenaged stepson. Breillat makes some intriguing choices in depicting these scenes of taboo, not to mention unlawful, intimacy between the two that alter the tenor of this relationship.

It's all in the faces. The first encounter between Anne and Théo, for example, keeps the camera planted as it stares at the teenage boy's face. There's an innocence there that goes beyond Kircher's youthful appearance, as his ecstasy is often tinged with surprise and childish glee. His visage in that shot is as much about communicating the undeniable fact that he is young, lost in this moment, and completely oblivious to what it actually means as it is about simple pleasure.

In that look, we see what almost inevitably transpires for the teen. He becomes obsessed with Anne and chasing that feeling again, jealous at her half-hearted protests that it can't happen again, and too free with his displays of affection and infatuation with her, because he is just a teenage boy lost in feelings he doesn't fully comprehend. Anne knows all of this, of course, and based on her profession, she also knows the potential psychological consequences for Théo. She should know better but doesn't act like she does.

The mystery of Anne, then, is stronger here than in the original, perhaps, if only because Drucker plays the role with unexpected vulnerability. This isn't to say that the film sympathizes with her, but it does want to understand her actions. What's haunting and upsetting about this version of material that's already plenty haunting and upsetting is how close it comes to some kind of comprehension. In one scene, Anne notes her first sexual encounter as something "that should never have happened," and there is her genuine empathy for the girls and young women she represents over the course of the story.

Is it something as complex as what that suggests, or is it simply the escape shown in her extended close-up during another encounter with Théo? There are three scenes of significant close-ups here, and all of them seem to say one thing directly, only for us to consider what they actually mean later. The third such shot is of a different face, sobbing in what initially seems to be apology. Once the film's final line is spoken, though, those tears might be coming for a different reason—of desperately struggling to accept what is completely unacceptable.

There's a surprising depth, in other words, to Last Summer and its depiction of various abuses. It's far from comforting, obviously, especially in the way these characters are or force themselves to be comfortable with what happens.

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