This Guédiguian movie was never theatrically released and it's sure easy to see why : the screenplay is very thin, some scenes seem impromptu ,it's almost experimental cinema;some of its scenes were used again as flashbacks in "la villa "; so was Dylan's "I want you" ,a great song ,but which sounds inappropriate in Guédiguian 's provençal background .
Four friends used to play in the garden of a bourgeois house ; they swore they would meet again when they grew up and here they are again , now three men and a woman ; they try to find again their simple joys of childhood , but realize how painful it is growing up ;even in this magic garden (the cinematography is luminous) , they can't come to terms with a fulfilled adult life .Now and then ,children appear by the gates of the lost paradise and increase their nostalgia .
Thanks to the excellent foursome , one can sit it through ; Darroussin is the stand- out in my book .
Guédiguian would resume the same situation in "Dieu vomit les tièdes" , but this time , his characters (played by the same actors)would have to face the outside world ; this one is perhaps the director's non-political work ,as though he were afraid for his characters .
