News

Chicago – All this fuss about Ben Affleck not getting nominated by the Academy after directing three decent flicks is even more inane in light of the fact that Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, arguably the greatest directing duo in modern cinema, haven’t garnered any Oscar attention. At all. Their latest naturalistic triumph, “The Kid with a Bike,” snagged a mere Golden Globe nod several months before it even premiered on U.S. screens.

The alleged edge-of-your-seat suspense in “Argo” has all the tautness of a snail race compared to the blistering tension conjured by the Dardenne Brothers as their camera confines the audience within the solitude, desperation and mounting dread of their troubled protagonists. “The Kid with a Bike” is the Dardennes’ most excruciatingly suspenseful and emotionally galvanizing effort since their 1996 breakthrough, “La Promesse.” Both films center on self-sufficient boys in danger of deteriorating into destructive products of their environment,...

The Kid With A Bike (12A)

(Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne, 2011, Bel/Fra/Ita) Thomas Doret, Cécile de France, Egon di Mateo, Jérémie Renier, Fabrizio Rongione. 87 mins

Once again, the Dardenne brothers pull you into the world of a poor, marginalised soul and keep you there, without resorting to any fancy tricks. How do they do it? In this case it's impulsive young Cyril: no mother, rejected by his father, no friends, and only his talismanic bike to cling to. What's to become of him? It sounds rather worthy but, in fact, it's an effortless watch – powerfully acted, paced like an action movie, and shifting into a higher gear of spiritual grace when it needs to.

The Hunger Games (12A)

(Gary Ross, 2012, Us) Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Wes Bentley, Donald Sutherland, Stanley Tucci. 143 mins

Teens are signed up, trained up and scrubbed up for a reality TV game of death in this...

The Kid with a Bike

Directed by: Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Luc Dardenne

Cast: Thomas Doret, Cecile De France, Egon Di Mateo

Running Time: 1 hr 28 mins

Rating: PG-13

Release Date: March 23, 2012 (Limited)

Plot: A conflicted young boy (Doret) is put under the weekend foster care of a hairdresser (De France) after his father declares he never wants to see him again.

Who’S It For?: Fans of patient dramas; those who liked De France in Hereafter, and are curious to see what else she can do. Those particularly interested in stories about youth, and youth being in danger.

Overall

Placed into the film footsteps of now classic movies like Cinema Paradiso and Oldboy, The Kid with a Bike was awarded the “Grand Prix” (Aka second place) at the most recent Cannes Film Festival. While The Kid with a Bike may not be as outwardly incredible as those aforementioned films and some others from “Grand Prix” history,...

Chicago – The sullen little boy is always on the run. His red shirt and jacket cause him to resemble a crimson blur against the green and gray landscape of his Belgian town. He believes that there must be an explanation for why his absent father has left him in a state-run youth farm, and is determined to track him down. Consumed with confusion and rage, the boy has no choice but to keep moving toward a destination that may not exist.

Rating: 4.5/5.0

This may sound like a hopelessly depressing premise, but in the hands of celebrated auteurs Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, it emerges as a riveting, immensely powerful meditation on the need for human connection. It’s also incredibly tense for a quietly nuanced drama, and viewers may find themselves spending much of the film holding their collective breaths with the hope that no harm will come to the pint-sized yet stubbornly resourceful protagonist.

Title: The Kid With a Bike Directors: Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne Starring: Jeremie Renier, Cecile de France, Thomas Doret, Egon Di Mateo Simple grace is a quality rarer in modern films than one might expect, as is the yard-by-yard, in-the-trenches slog of messy human connection, absent a lot of cathartic speechifying. Both are on rich display in French import “The Kid With a Bike,” however, the winner of the Grand Jury Prize at last year’s Cannes Film Festival, and a Best Foreign Language Film Golden Globe nominee. With their latest movie, fraternal portraitists Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne deliver a compelling character study of adolescent emotional dislocation, shining a light on the weight of both nature [ Read More ]...

The following is a reprint of our review from the Cannes Film Festival.

All the books on parenting notwithstanding, it's always been pretty simple: kids not only want love, they need it. And in the latest from Jean Pierre and Luc Dardenne that need is amplified into a mellifluous tone of desperation encapsulated in little Cyril (Thomas Doret) the titular 'kid with a bike.' When the film opens Cyril literally can't believe what he's hearing: left by his father in a children's home (it's hinted that his mother is dead), he calls the number he has for his Dad, only to hear that the line is no longer in service. He's told that his father has moved without leaving a forwarding address and, unconvinced, he leaves school one morning to go there himself where he not only finds an empty apartment but learns that his bike is gone as well.

It seems like we’ve heard about this film for years, but Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne‘s The Kid With a Bike is finally hitting stateside next month. We’ve praised the drama at both Nyff and Cannes and now a new trailer has arrived to go along with the release. This piece shows off a poetic side, with some gorgeous music running throughout. Starring Cécile de France, Thomas Doret, Jérémie Renier, Fabrizio Rongione, Egon Di Mateo and Olivier Gourmet, Bike is another knock-out from the Dardennes, featuring wonderfully realized relationships and stirring performances. Check out the new trailer and poster below via Apple.

Synopsis:

Winner of the Grand Jury Prize at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, the deeply moving new film by the Dardenne brothers (L’enfant, Rosetta) delves into the emotional life of troubled 11-year-old Cyril (newcomer Thomas Doret). When his father (Jeremie Renier) abandons him, Cyril...

The Kid with a Bike / Le Gamin au Vélo

Directed by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne

Written by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne

France/Belgium/Italy, 2011

The style of brothers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne might not sound immediately appealing to someone who has never seen one of their films. The Belgians usually avoid working with big stars, glamorous locations or lush orchestrations. Their themes include poverty, unemployment and the everyday struggles of people on the margins. But Cannes Juries love them — Rosetta and The Child are both past winners of the coveted Palme d’Or. This year’s Grand Prix winner, The Kid with a Bike, is another brilliant example of no-frills film-making that grabs you from the shot and makes you care.

That title is reminiscent of Vittorio De Sica’s Bicycle Thieves (1948), but here 11-year-old Cyril (Thomas Doret) has lost both his dad and his beloved vélo. (There’s no mum,...

"Modern cinema's poets laureate of working-class marginalization and spiritual crises, Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne are also bona fide motion-picture makers whose works brim with the kind of propulsive thrust that would have left pure action pioneers like Raoul Walsh or Allan Dwan green with envy," writes Fernando F Croce at the House Next Door — he also interviews the Dardennes for Slant. "Think of the Belgian brothers' new film, and the first thing that springs to mind is a red shirt zipping kinetically up and down and across the screen, rushing in and out of corridors when not climbing fences and trees."

The Kid with a Bike is "the tale of a young boy abandoned by his deadbeat father and the emotional delinquency that ensues," writes Michael Guillén at Twitch. "Angry, nearly feral, and desperate for his father's love, Cyril (in a volatile turn by Thomas Doret) has to learn that...

Chicago International Film Festival 2011

The Kid with a Bike

Directed by: Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Luc Dardenne

Cast: Thomas Doret, Cecile De France, Egon Di Mateo

Running Time: 1 hr 28 mins

Rating: Nr

Release Date: Tbd

Click Here for complete coverage of the Chicago International Film Festival (Ciff 2011)

Plot: A conflicted young boy (Doret) is put under the weekend foster care of a hairdresser (De France) after his father declares he never wants to see him again.

Who’S It For?: Fans of patient dramas; those who liked De France in Hereafter, and are curious to see what else she can do. Those particularly interested in stories about youth, and youth being in danger.

Overall

Placed into the film footsteps of now classic movies like Cinema Paradiso and Oldboy,The Kid with a Bike was awarded the “Grand Prix” (Aka second place) at the most recent Cannes Film Festival. While The Kid...