L'eau froide AKA Cold Water (1994) FotW #360

[Cocoa]

Film of the Week #360: L'eau froide AKA Cold Water (1994)



Summary:
When the girl of a rebelious teenage couple finds out she is being sent away, they both believe escaping the rigid order suffocating them is the only way to be free. But is it?


#238 on 500<400, with 247 checks.
Nominated by 72aicm, filmbantha, joachimt, and Melvelet.
On IMDb
On iCM

From the 500<400 results

#238(NEW) L'eau froide (1994)
[Cold Water]

Directed by: Olivier Assayas
(420.09 Pts, 10 Votes) , Top 1–10–50: 0–2–4
History: 238←756←1051←733←791←991←NA←NA

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ICheckMovies: 244 Checks , 26 Favourites , 1 Official list

List of Voters:

toro913 (2)
clemmetarey (7)
jeff_v (30)
sebby (46)
GruesomeTwosome (81)
beavis (98)
dinah (NA)
brokenface (134)
lineuphere (136)
Lilarcor (300)

Here is a schedule of all the FotW.

[Melvelet]

Damn, I'm looking forward to this one but 44 film festival movies in 29 days is quite a task for me without adding any others. I hope I get around to it afterwards.

[Cocoa]

I liked the soundtrack.

[allisoncm]

I liked the soundtrack.

I believe its inclusion of "Me and Bobby McGee" is what held it up being licensed on DVD in the USA for so long. I think it was over 20 years before we finally got it here in the USA besides the occasional showing on cable.

[Dolwphin]

L'eau froide 4/10

I disliked the claustrophobic aesthetics. The camera is often too close for my taste. I found the characters uninteresting. This partly because they are impossible to understand. Their actions often comes from nowhere. The teenagers are supposed to rebel against authoritarian constraints of childhood, but they lack any motivation for misbehaving. I suppose the female teenagers mental illness could serve as the ultimate psychological motivation, but maybe she is only intended to be viewed as socially awkward? Obviously the entire narrative (as implied by the films title) is designed to emphasize and culminate in its ending. But I don't understand why the female teenager makes that decision. All this uncertainty creates the opposite of an immersive experience. The best portion of the film is the prolonged party sequence, mostly because of the excellent soundtrack.