Water Lillies is one of those French films that normally I would hate, and truth be told, if you held a gun to my head and asked me to pick between that and ‘Echo Park LA’, another film that features virginity ‘loss’, I would choose Echo Park or ‘Quinceanera’ as it was originally known. But that’s just me and there’s a reason for it. I like happy. I like bright and I like warm weather. Whilst elements of Echo Park LA are harsh, the story is told against the rich vibrant background of Latino life in the Sunshine state – California – with a guaranteed 365 days of nice weather per year. Life might be hard but the temperature is hot and the ‘uncle’ of the film is the owner of one of the cutest little gardens I have ever seen.
Horticultural preferences asides, ‘Water Lillies’ is another kettle of fish altogether. You know those French films that are set in the geographical equivalent of Staines? Not even Staines but Staines in the sticks. Staines in the middle of nowhere with nothing to do and nowhere to go and the director never lets you forget this for even a moment or tries to dress this town up to be anything other than what it is. This is the filmic version of heroin chic. No frills, no spills, just real life with all the glamour of a bare bulb swinging back and forth across a sparsely decorated bedroom.
I’m just trying to flag up some of the internal prejudices that this rookie film reviewer has to wrestle with when she steps into the cinema and frankly I don’t suppose I shall be spending much of my life reviewing films for anyone other than myself with that attitude but I will say this: ‘Water Lilies’ is a terrific film.
This is a film that takes you back to a time when stuff mattered. I don’t mean the stuff that you think about now: houses, mortgages, jobs and money, I mean the important stuff. Desire, boys, girls and hormones. Do you remember when the four walls that surrounded your bedroom felt like the universe? Do you remember the first time you felt like you might die if the feelings you felt were not reciprocated? This film does. It takes us slap bang into the world of three very different young women as they explore their first forays into the world of physical love.
There are no holds barred here, literally and figuratively. The director pulls no punches when she illustrates how the foxier of the three goes about the technical loss of her virginity – I don’t want to ruin this scene for you, you’ll have to see it. These are young urban women with nothing to hold them back from pursuing their teenage desires, unlike the protagonist of my other new favorite film, ‘Echo Park LA’ – a bit of a misnomer actually as it came out in 2006.
Magdalena has no such luck. She is on the eve of her ‘Quinceanera’. This is the traditional Mexican celebration that informs the world of a girl’s impending woman hood. Virginal women hood. ‘Quinceanera’ means fifteen and as such, all fifteen-year old Mexican girls are supposed to be ‘pure’. This is a problem for Magdalena because she is pregnant.
Here we arrive at a theme that these two films share. One of the modern absurdities of our time is the misinformed belief that an inconsequential piece of skin is a reliable indication of virginity. Every sane person knows that a hymen can be broken in so many ways, none of which involve sexual intercourse.
For our French sisters, this tiny piece of skin represents nothing more than a physical barrier, something to be removed quite literally, again – I won’t tell you how – and, most importantly, in order to save face. No one wants to be a big prissy virgin. But for Magdalena, the presence of this anatomical detail is a saving grace. She might be pregnant but she didn’t have sex – at least not the penetrative kind.
And yes, in case you are wondering, it is possible to get up the duff this way. My friend’s thirteen-year old daughter is living proof of this fact. Hello? Fingers can fit into all sorts of places and sperm can swim!! Luckily for Magdalena, this oversight has been noted by the local doctor, luckily for us, not before our hapless heroine is dispatched to live with the other black sheep of her family, her gay cousin. Here the film finds its heart between the tender interplay of these characters and their protector, the lovely garden owning great uncle.
Neither film takes a moral stance on any of this activity; it merely observes the characters as they struggle to take their first sexual steps whilst being judged against the activities of their peers – Water Lillies, and the social mores of their elders – Echo Park LA.
Water Lillies may lack the surface sunshine of ‘Echo Park’ but it has a very warm core – topped off by some truly beautiful performances. OK, I know these girls are professional actors but this is some serious subject material and they carry it off superbly. Ditto Echo Park, which strays into documentary territory at times, so visceral are the emotions expressed by these actors.
Both films echo what I reach to achieve on this blog – the gravity and the humor of some very serious situations. For some people, the loss of virginity is literally life threatening. For others the consequences may not be so drastic, at least not to the naked eye.
Echo Park LA is available here.
Water Lillies is out on 14 March in the UK. Take a look…
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