Simply Perfect

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

It's amazing, an English actress playing a moody, sensual French young mother, hiding an enigmatic darker side, unleashed at the end of this film. Sasha Hails walks the walk and talks the talk, strangely unfazed by the threatening presence of a course, uncouth backpacker, initially camping in her backyard, but before long babysitting, almost playing the role of au pair, which had first borough Sasha to France. The visitor, Tatiana, played by Marina de Van (surely it should be vin, given the amount of wine they consume?) is obviously the unsettling element - initially. But as with all good French movies, even short ones like this, you're left wondering who, in the end, is stranger, Sasha, having sex with strangers in the woods while leaving her baby on the beach or Tatiana, with the apparent nihilism of her diary, dark hangmen, twisted doodles and a propensity to ask strange, detailed questions about childbirth? I was flumoxed by the ending; who had done what? In the end, I deduced with Sherlock Holmesian logic, it must have been Sasha, how else could the ropes have been tied? But then, going on a boat, uncaring, nonchalant, as her husband arrives home from his business trip to Paris, unzipping Tatiana's tent, making a discovery enough to put him off camping for life? Ah, yes, now I know: Sasha is really the dark player, the other girl, merely the mixed up backpacker. I think. Not horrific, not a masterpiece, a 52 minute vignette of Anglo French foibles and sexual deviance. Forgive me, I must go and lick my plate clean.

A scruffy girl backpacker Tatiana (Marina de Van) shows up at the beach house of a Parisian young mom, the English Sasha (Sasha Hails), who has a 10-month-old baby--and demands permission to pitch her tent in the back yard. The dad is working in Paris and only shows up at the end of the film's 52-minute running time. (De Van was to appear again in Ozon's Sit Com). The mom precedes to trust the obviously suspicious and ominously aggressive and affect-less outsider far too much--to the torment of nervous viewers. A rather minimalist horror flick, this shows Ozon's characteristic visual elegance and economy but leans dangerously far toward the more glib aspect of his rarely absent desire to shock. One of the hardest of his films to watch, but not one of the more convincing ones. Various elements strain credulity and others are not even really made clear. Roger Ebert wrote a very good (if typically over-kind) review.. This was Ozon's longest film so far. Though not well reviewed in this country his Criminal Lovers/Les amants criminels (1999), with the naturally combustible couple of Jeremie Renier and real-life girlfriend Natacha Regnier, was longer (96 min.) and a huge improvement.

My main reason for seeking out this film was due to the fact that it's directed by one of the great filmmakers of today, Francois Ozon. You can always count on Ozon to deliver a well observed tale of the unexpected, and even though he lacked experience at the time this film was made, it's still a great way to spend 52 minutes of your life. From Ozon's later movies, the one I would say this one most closely resembles is the seductive thriller Swimming Pool, as Ozon captures the meeting of two very different women and the resulting absurdity that stems from that meeting. See the Sea is a lot grittier than Swimming Pool, however, and if his objective with this film was to make an impact; he definitely succeeded in doing just that. The film focuses on Sasha, a young woman living a peaceful life with her baby daughter in a beach house. Her life is disrupted one day when another woman by the name of Tatiana asks if she may camp out on Sasha's land. Sasha agrees, and the film follows the relationship between the two over the course of a few days.This film is very short, running at just 52 minutes; but Ozon makes great use of his time, and overall I've got to say that I'd have been happy for him to drag the story out more. The pace of the film is very relaxed, but it's always obvious that it's leading to a sinister conclusion. Ozon builds the tension between the characters well, and by constantly hinting that there's more to the eerie stranger that meets the eye, the director skilfully entices his audience into the central situation. The build-up to the final resolution is never terribly shocking (toothbrush scene aside), but it's always foreboding and this bodes excellently with the shock climax. The style of the film is very down and dirty, and the film doesn't feature the picturesque settings and cinematography of the later Swimming Pool. The way that the director finally shows his hand is absolutely superb, however, as the character that has been referred to but never seen until the end comes home to survey the damage to his family home. Overall, See the Sea is a distressing and damaging film that leaves the viewer with something to think about, and while the director has done better; this early film is well worth seeing.

This movie holds your attention for some reason. However, let me warn you it is very strange. 1.) What mother would leave her child with a stranger she JUST met while the mother goes shopping? 2.) What mother would leave her baby hundreds of yards away ALONE on a beach while the mother gets oral sex from a gay man in a gay assignation wooded lot? 3.) Nice bodies on the two women - ugly face on the backpacker though. 4.) What is the story for the backpacker? The short conversation between the backpacker and the mother about the birth process for the mother is "revealing" but does not seem to really develop the backpacker's rationale. 5.) The ending would seem logical for a suspense/horror film if there had been more background earlier in the film. 6.) This film could be considered a "short" due to its low level of character development - but the film is almost one hour.