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| Writer/director Laura Wandel |
PLAYGROUND (Un Monde) B Belgium (72 mi) 2021 d: Laura Wandel
Not your typical film about kids, as this exposes the everyday cruelties that kids inflict on each other in school playgrounds around the world, where the cruel fact is adults are not there coming to the rescue of those being bullied, so the abuse continues. This is an immersive viewing experience, where the French title of “(Un Monde) The World” more perfectly encapsulates the playground as “the entire world” for these kids, as all the societal behavior patterns develop within that chaotic environment and defines who they will become as adults, as teachers only appear peripherally, often seen cut-off from the edge of the screen, as if they don’t fit, becoming something of a horror story seen through the inquisitive eyes of a young 7-year old. The director is a graduate of Belgium’s Institut des Arts de Diffusion, where the Dardennes brothers are the cultural model for Belgian filmmakers, using a minimalist style with handheld cameras following the protagonists around wherever they go, expressing a naturalism that is as humanistic as it is devastating, providing a physical reconstruction of a near documentary, cinéma vérité style, though Chantal Akerman’s Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du Commerce,1080 Bruxelles (1976) also provides the rhythmic template for immersive filmmaking. In the closing credits, thanks are given to Luc Dardenne, Alain Berliner, and Rebecca Zlotowski, among a host of others, though François Truffaut’s The 400 Blows (Les quatre cents coups) (1959) may be the most influential film about young children ever made. Perhaps following in the footsteps of Claire Simon’s RÉCRÉATIONS (1998), a documentary exposing the trauma linked with children’s schoolyard games, or Play (2011), Ruben Östlund’s tale of sophisticated psychological bullying among Swedish adolescents, this film is quite unlike any other, working with the kids for three months before shooting began without ever providing them a script, using a gritty neo-realistic style set completely within the confines of a primary school, reminding us of the constant noise, the social hierarchies, and the fear of being different, where the focus of attention is young seven-year-old Nora (Maya Vanderbeque), who arrives at the same school attended by her ten-year old brother Abel (Günter Duret). Brought to the school gates by her father (Karim Leklou), the overly shy Nora literally clings to him as an unwilling participant, saying tearful goodbyes, not wanting to let go, yet she must learn to navigate her way through unchartered territory, just as anyone does when they start a new school, with the camera seeing only what she sees, providing her unique perspective throughout the entire film. In something of a strange twist, we quickly learn it’s not Nora who is bullied, but her older brother, who is viciously brutalized by older, more physically imposing students picking on him, finding himself trapped in a spiral of violence that he cannot escape, forced to endure endless humiliation and torment. Initially Nora runs to a teacher to intervene, but they’re usually distracted by something else at the moment, so by the time they arrive, the damage has already been done, or Abel refuses to incriminate his abusers, thinking it would only escalate and get worse.
Five years in the making, having visited schools across the country while speaking to parents and teachers, the film premiered in the Un Certain Regard section at the Cannes Film Festival in 2021, winning a FIPRESCI Award, and was selected as the Belgian entry for the Best International Feature at the Academy Awards, but did not make the cut down to the final five, and was released only in arthouse theaters playing to minimal audiences. Among the more unique features is the sound design, filled with children background noise or classroom quiet, with no use of music anywhere, where according to the director, “The brutality of the playground is conveyed through the noise.” The graphic depiction of some of these atrocities is horrific, so viewers beware, as this is not for the faint of heart, reminiscent of torture treatment, which is simply heartbreaking, as Abel has no defense except to suffer the consequences. The film also exposes the effect this has on Nora, who wants to help her brother, even at the risk of receiving blows from his abusers, whose faces are rarely seen, but he wants her to stay away, as it only gets worse when she’s around, so he makes her swear not to say a word to their father. Slowly she acclimates herself to her own classroom situation, an outsider with no allies or friends, where she’s forced to hear the ridicule her brother is subjected to, stifling her emotions, with students laughing at his expense, and soon enough she’s the one being bullied for being the sister of the kid being bullied. Shot at a low angle by Frédéric Noirhomme, with the constantly moving camera strapped to his waist, a technique that was similarly used by Céline Sciamma in Petite Maman (2021), it holds tight on Nora’s face with demanding close-ups, allowing her no room to breathe, existing in such constricted space that viewers will feel overwhelmed as well while we follow her in her class, the lunch room, and the playground. Nora continually has her eyes out for these repeated occurrences, as they happen out in the open with such regularity that it would seem impossible for teachers to miss, where the most disheartening aspect is that her brother never fights back, adding a fatalistic tone of defeatist resignation, as this behavior becomes imprinted into his personality. It’s also shocking that his parents wouldn’t notice his sullen outlook and total social exclusion, but their home life is never seen or mentioned, where any signs of a mother remains a mystery, as it’s her stay-at-home father who delivers her to school each day, becoming a subject of taunting as well, with suggestions that he must be a lazy “freeloader” because he doesn’t have a job. Nora has to fend off all these accusations without really understanding the circumstances herself, yet when she asks her father why he doesn’t work like the other dads, he remains utterly clueless about the implications, ignoring the bruises Abel brings home as well, all too easily accepting his fabrication that they resulted from soccer practice. This pattern continues, as she’s so wrapped up in her own world that adults barely exist, offering little more than standard platitudes, expressing scant interest in her welfare.
At some point, however, the atrocities are so demeaning that she defies her brother and tells her father, identifying the guilty tormentors, who are hauled into the principal’s office with their parents and forced to apologize, something viewers hear but never see, as it happens off camera. It’s an interesting way to frame such an impactful moment, where it’s viewed as purely tangential, not the real focus. There is no reason to believe the bullying stops, as that’s not the nature of forced apologies, as they tend to have little effect unless they are accompanied by more serious consequences. The film triggers painful childhood memories, as viewers may recall their own painful misadventures, yet the observational tone of the film is exceedingly instructive, providing a window into the lives of young children not often seen, exposing events that can be traumatizing, including Nora’s own trepidation about jumping into a pool or learning to swim, or walking on a balance beam before she’s even learned to tie her shoes, while there are also amusing moments just watching kids being kids, playing silly games, or finding hilarity in biting their sandwiches into animal shapes and then guessing what it is. Kids also just make up things, but at that age, it’s difficult to counter some of these outrageous statements, where instilling fear may be the real intent. Navigating her way through this labyrinth of unexpected pitfalls is no easy task, especially when there’s no one along the way to offer help. Apparently nothing has more importance at this age than being invited to a friend’s birthday party, or the shame of being excluded, where this is a monumental event in Nora’s world, where it’s difficult to handle the pressure of missed opportunities, where her brother is usually to blame, as no one wants to be associated with an object of ridicule. She even disavows that he’s her brother at one point, hoping to be ingratiated into the social clique, but his scorn is hers to live with as well, as she begins to be rejected by her friends, which puts her at risk of being ostracized, like her brother. There is an empathetic teacher (Laura Verlinden), but she is inexplicably transferred out mid-term, leaving an exasperated Nora to offer a tearful goodbye, a scene of rare tenderness and genuine emotion. Abel finally makes an adjustment, but it’s a cruel turn, as he learns the only way to avoid being bullied is to become a bully, so he starts targeting a dark-skinned kid named Ismaël (Naël Ammama), singling him out for abuse, joined by those that used to pick on him, but as Ismaël is one of the few boys that Nora has befriended, this is utterly devastating. It’s a strange twist of fate, revealing a cruel underside to the playground social dynamic, ending on an ambiguous note that suggests there’s really no beginning and no end to this aberrant behavior, it just is, unless society has the capacity to demand something better for their children. While it never rises to the childhood poetry of Truffaut or Maurice Pialat’s L’ENFANCE NUE (1968), this first-time feature was one of the discoveries of the year, where the performance by Vanderbeque, who literally carries the film, reveals an astonishing range for any age, and is arguably the film’s biggest takeaway. Already she’s been enlisted for a Gaumont German television series.
