Wild Side [DVD]

This is maybe one of the most powerful urban stories of the decade. Told with tremendous sensibility and encompassing all aspects and the diverse views all present in today's contemporary life. We are all the same, human above all and even though we tried to look different, look for clues on the edge or try to adapt in new environments we still cling onto our desires and needs to make of all a beatiful whole. Tremendously refreshing and hopefull movie!

Interesting film. Different type of fim. Highly recommend.

What a beautiful film, in every way. What a scene, when the mother turns to her daughter and says, "have I hurt your feelings?" Beautifully done. The opening scene with Antony Hegarty singing "I fell in love with a dead boy," is unforgettable. There is nothing I would change about this film except perhaps the title. I believe something might have been lost in translation?

This movie shows how love can connect us all and that support is very important for a relationship. The three main Characters are pretty good actors and made the sory come alive.

love this one.

A bit of an eye opener, different.

After watching 'All About My Mother' I popped this DVD in. Opens with the prostitution scene, poorly lit and grainy. Fast Forward. Random dudes playing soccer, FF bathroom sex scene, FF. Random scenes from childhood. Random scene of field, rundown farmhouse, FF. Ask myself 'why am I watching this?' Emotionless scene of mom & daughter, random scene of childhood, mother speaking to Russian guy who doesn't understand. Enough. Press stop. Donate to library so no one else spends money on this turkey. I suspect the reason they hired amateurs is because the actors guild wouldn't allow a pro to be in this. I guess the title is ironic. The whole cast appears to be on Valium, including the editor. "Maybe if we let this random scene run even longer it will be meaninful". This is my first review but I just felt the need to warn people.

Sébastien Lifshitz ('Come Undone', 'The Crossing') is one of the more sensitive directors to arrive on the scene in some time. He molds stories about the periphery of mankind and creates deeply human dramas without the clutter and noise that often dampen the effect of intense emotional experiences. He is intelligent, a fine writer and observer and a man unafraid to take chances: all but two of the actors in WILD SIDE are amateurs with no experience in front of the camera and from these neophytes he extracts brilliant performances. He is an artist to watch. Stéphanie (Stéphanie Michelini) is a transsexual who makes her living through prostitution on the streets of Paris. She is a gentle, soft-spoken, tender person who is making her way in life as the being she has selected to present. She meets Djamel (Yasmine Belmadi) a handsome bisexual North African young man who likewise makes his living turning tricks in the subways and streets of Paris, another person estranged from his family as is Stéphanie. Yet another young man Mikhail (Edouard Nikitine) estranged from his family in Russia meets Stéphanie and falls in love with her. The three outsiders from a true ménage a trois, all three genetically males, all three in need of love and belonging and capable of sharing love equally within the trio. When Stéphanie learns her estranged mother (Josiane Stoléru) is critically ill, she travels to her rural French neighborhood of her youth together with Mikhail and Djamel and it is this confrontation with her past and the way she pieces her life together with the love of Mikhail and Djamel that creates the beauty of this film. Though there are innumerable reasons for recommending this film the main one remains the manner in which Lifshitz has taken a script written with his long-term associate and fellow professor at La Fémis (Paris) Stéphane Bouquet about a marginalized portion of society and crafted one of the more touching love stories that needs and receives no apologies. Stéphanie (the actress is a transsexual in real life and has never acted before) is presented not as an oddity but as just a human being for whom life has dealt some challenges. We see her in the opening scenes fully nude with the lovely body of a female that happens to also have male genitalia. The isolation of Stéphanie's life is shown from the beginning in a scene where a group of transsexuals listen tearfully as a singer (Antony Hegarty) sings a tender ballad 'I fell in love with a beautiful dead boy...but was he a girl or a boy?'. This quiet manner pervades the film. Mikhail is likewise played by an unknown inexperienced actor and plumbs the depths of his lonely Russian émigré with gently nuanced humility. Djamel and Stephanie's mother are played by actors with whom Lifshitz has worked before and their superlative work helps coax the best performances from the neophytes. The breathtaking cinematography is by Agnès Godard, a genius for creating atmosphere and mood, equally successful in the cramped environs where the sex for money acts are performed as well as in the beauty of the Parisian streets and the French rural countryside. The subtle music score by Jocelyn Pook is variations by a string quartet and harp and very well composed. The DVD gratefully includes and interview with Lifshitz and for once the information shared is extremely beneficial to the enjoyment of the film. Because audiences in general have difficulty with trans/homosexual love scenes this film will probably never receive the recognition it deserves. But for those who long for the power of truly fine independent films, this film is as fine as they come - in story, in direction, in acting, in cinematography and, most important, in honesty. It is a jewel of a movie. Highly Recommended. Grady Harp, December 05

I thought this film was beautifully made. However, the finest scenes are interspersed with some long, fairly slow parts, with lots of meaningful glances and very little happening. When things do happen, they really do happen though. There are some pretty strong sex scenes which I personally enjoyed because I found them realistic rather than "manufactured". The Director also took his cameras out into the Bois de Boulogne in Paris and filmed scenes that I have never seen any other film show, of the transsexual prostitutes who work the "Bois" at night. Stephanie is a transsexual. That is no secret right from the start of the film. I watched the film with my girlfriend, who is also a transsexual, and she found Stephanie sympathetic and convincing. Need I say more? So, slow in places but hang on in there. It is ultimately a rewarding film and some of the images will stay in your mind for a long time afterwards. I will watch it again and again.

Excellent!

Ein überaus außergewöhnlicher Film über drei Menschen, die auf der Suche sind nach sich selbst und ihrer sexuellen Identität, alle samt müssen sie Toleranz zeigen und lernen was es heißt zu geben und zu empfangen. -Stephane die attraktive Transe -Djamel, derGelegenheitstricher -Mikhail, der Ex-Soldat Alle drei überzeugen durch leidenschaftliche Darstellung und allerberste Vermittlung ihrer "Charakterrolle". Malerisch schöne intime Szenen, schon ein wenig verwunderlich, wie sich Stephanie mit ihrer prächtigen Erregung verwöhnen und erobern lässt. Einfach ist der Film nicht, auch ein wenig anstrengend, da man sich quasi selbst einbringen muss, versuchen zu verstehen was hinter all den Reaktionen und Gefühlen stecken mag. Bravouröse, offenherzige und sehr überzeugende, doch extravagante filmische Inszenierung und Komposition!

Ce n'est pas le bon film

Coming back to Sebastien Lifshitz's 2004 film four and a half years after first seeing it, it makes a better impression than before. This may be because of his fantastic documentary, Les Invisibles, and the photobook of his own collection of vintage photos by the same name, that are really outstanding in contemporary French culture. It still has the same flaws, above all that of being underwritten, but it seems as if Lifshitz is rejecting psychology, really. His story of three marginal characters, Stephanie, who is pre-op transgender, Djamel, an Algerian hustler who picks up men or women at the station for sex in the toilets (with nicely textured walls in the cubicles), and Russian soldier Mikhail, who hardly speaks a word of French but works in a restaurant and boxes, is one full of tenderness and strangeness. It is like ingredients in a recipe that are just thrown together and create a unique flavour, without looking into the whys and wherefores. It is a quiet film, for all the sensationalism inherent in the kinkiness of some of the scenes ... the characters are touching together, and their menage a trois is something you want to believe in, even if you can't quite. Stephanie's mother falls seriously ill and she takes off from Paris to look after her somewhere in the north, in the countryside, The other two follow, and scenes from the mother's house are interspersed with others of their life together in Paris, and some flashbacks to Stephanie's childhood, with a few photos from Djamel's. One usually imagines transgender characters to be more extravert, but really there is no reason why they should be, and a more introverted person like Stephanie is quite original on screen. Liftshitz creates some stunning images. Both men are shown from the rear in sexual scenarios that have a certain charge, without being pornographic. It is sad to read that the actor who plays Djamel, Yasmine Belmadi, died in a road accident in 2009. He was in a couple of roles along similar lines to this one, and gives a soulful performance here.