From the director of Home (SFIFF 2009) comes this powerfully-acted story of siblings living near a Swiss ski resort. It’s the winter holiday and 12-year-old petty thief Simon (Kacey Mottet Klein) takes advantage of the tourist influx to ply his trade, boarding the gondola that whisks him out of the valley where he lives to the heady altitudes where the leisure class plays. His older sister Louise (Léa Seydoux) is the less practical of the pair, preferring doomed romantic alliances to actual daily labor. With no parents in sight, Simon is the main breadwinner but looks to Louise for support and love, responses she is frequently unable to give. Reminiscent of the brand of social realism perfected by the Dardennes brothers, Ursula Meier makes remarkable use of her picturesque setting, sharply delineating the difference between the haves and the have-nots and effectively employing immensely talented actors, including Gillian Anderson and Martin Compston in supporting roles.


Written by Antoine Jaccoud, Ursula Meier, Photographed by Agnès Godard. With Kacey Mottet Klein, Léa Seydoux, Martin Compston, Gillian Anderson, Jean-François Stévenin (100 min, In French and English with subtitles, Adopt Films).