It is never my style to defend a movie just because people disagree with me. Yet looking through all the comments that slam the movie for having no plot, and even those who like the movie are unable to provide any solid reasons other than the encrypted deeply moving or honest, I feel the need to give my two sense. So bear with me.
Let me first say that I don't think Presque Rien is the best gay movie ever made. Looking at the cover with two naked young guys, I expect it will offer little more than "tasteful" eye candy. But I came away feeling this is a lot better than I expect, and for the exact reason so many other complain about, the plot.
The story unfolds with Mathieu, after suffering from depression; revisit his family summerhouse to pull his life together. It is the same place where two summers ago he met his first boyfriend, someone he just broke up with. Upon arriving, Mathieu pick up a wild cat that's roaming on the street. In the flashback, when Mathieu arrives his family summerhouse for vacation he "picked up" a wild child, Cédric, who basically lives on the street. Instantly we can draw the connection between Cédric and the cat: Mathieu said to the cat "You are cute but you stink". It reminds us in the flashback how he rehearses his introduction line to Cédric to the mirror: "I must admit you are pretty cute". After Mathieu bathed the cat he said you are my little prince charming, just as the carefree and attractive Cédric would be to any gay teenager falling in love for the first time. But there is the less fortune comparison: like the cat, Cédric, as much as he wants Mathieu, is unable to reciprocate the kind of affection Mathieu needs in a relationship.
There is one key scene I find surprising that no one mentions is when Mathieu and Cédric visited a historic ruin. Architecture student Mathieu is interested in reading the background of the site but Cedric is only interested in a private intimate moment together - to him it is just a bunch of rock. Mathieu complained that Cédric has single track of mind and he doesn't like it when Cédric is like that. It is a telling sign of the difference between the two and how problematic the relationship could be. However, Mathieu (and many audience I bet) are so charmed by the good-looking and sexually uninhibited Cédric that he (and us) are blinded to the fact that Cédric is unable to bond with Mathieu in a non-physical way. Recall that Cédric was totally oblivious to any of the Mathieu's emotional problem when Mathieu's psychiatrist asked him, except that Mathieu is not interested in having sex in the past month, again only in a physical way.
The ending, so many of the comments have criticized, is actually very satisfying for me. While it seems contrive that Mathieu should reach out for his boyfriend's ex, it is not hard to understand what draws him to Pierre. Cédric doesn't believe in family and would rather be a renegade than being introduced to Mathieu's father. But outside of his house, we see the domestic Pierre helping out his mother in setting up dinner. Mathieu himself longingly browsed through the family photos, including his pain-in-the-ass sister, the first thing he arrived his family home in years. When Mathieu asked Pierre why he didn't have his own place, Pierre as-a-matter-of-factly said "Why? To be All Alone?" The Mathieu who impulsively moved in with Cédric to a total strange city can certainly understand that sentiment. (When Pierre asked Mathieu if he think he is lame, Mathieu replied that he thinks he seems `really together')
The movie concluded with Mathieu and Pierre coming across a lonely child in the beach (presumably his dad is also present but he was intentionally excluded from the frame). Pierre showed his paternal side by teaching the kid how to play football/soccer as Mathieu knowingly looking on. In the flashback, the naive and love-struck Mathieu was totally captivated by Cédric as he sang and danced in the buff at the beach, the post-depression, wiser and more mature Mathieu (something Pierre didn't fail to notice), once again sitting on a beach, now saw the side of Pierre that he knows he wouldn't find in Cédric.
I don't dare to say my interpretation is THE interpretation. But I hate to see people dismiss scenes as pointless and boring, went on to accuse the movie has no plot and provides no answer when the very scenes they dismiss provide the clues they are looking for. For that, I feel I have to put down my view.
Let me first say that I don't think Presque Rien is the best gay movie ever made. Looking at the cover with two naked young guys, I expect it will offer little more than "tasteful" eye candy. But I came away feeling this is a lot better than I expect, and for the exact reason so many other complain about, the plot.
The story unfolds with Mathieu, after suffering from depression; revisit his family summerhouse to pull his life together. It is the same place where two summers ago he met his first boyfriend, someone he just broke up with. Upon arriving, Mathieu pick up a wild cat that's roaming on the street. In the flashback, when Mathieu arrives his family summerhouse for vacation he "picked up" a wild child, Cédric, who basically lives on the street. Instantly we can draw the connection between Cédric and the cat: Mathieu said to the cat "You are cute but you stink". It reminds us in the flashback how he rehearses his introduction line to Cédric to the mirror: "I must admit you are pretty cute". After Mathieu bathed the cat he said you are my little prince charming, just as the carefree and attractive Cédric would be to any gay teenager falling in love for the first time. But there is the less fortune comparison: like the cat, Cédric, as much as he wants Mathieu, is unable to reciprocate the kind of affection Mathieu needs in a relationship.
There is one key scene I find surprising that no one mentions is when Mathieu and Cédric visited a historic ruin. Architecture student Mathieu is interested in reading the background of the site but Cedric is only interested in a private intimate moment together - to him it is just a bunch of rock. Mathieu complained that Cédric has single track of mind and he doesn't like it when Cédric is like that. It is a telling sign of the difference between the two and how problematic the relationship could be. However, Mathieu (and many audience I bet) are so charmed by the good-looking and sexually uninhibited Cédric that he (and us) are blinded to the fact that Cédric is unable to bond with Mathieu in a non-physical way. Recall that Cédric was totally oblivious to any of the Mathieu's emotional problem when Mathieu's psychiatrist asked him, except that Mathieu is not interested in having sex in the past month, again only in a physical way.
The ending, so many of the comments have criticized, is actually very satisfying for me. While it seems contrive that Mathieu should reach out for his boyfriend's ex, it is not hard to understand what draws him to Pierre. Cédric doesn't believe in family and would rather be a renegade than being introduced to Mathieu's father. But outside of his house, we see the domestic Pierre helping out his mother in setting up dinner. Mathieu himself longingly browsed through the family photos, including his pain-in-the-ass sister, the first thing he arrived his family home in years. When Mathieu asked Pierre why he didn't have his own place, Pierre as-a-matter-of-factly said "Why? To be All Alone?" The Mathieu who impulsively moved in with Cédric to a total strange city can certainly understand that sentiment. (When Pierre asked Mathieu if he think he is lame, Mathieu replied that he thinks he seems `really together')
The movie concluded with Mathieu and Pierre coming across a lonely child in the beach (presumably his dad is also present but he was intentionally excluded from the frame). Pierre showed his paternal side by teaching the kid how to play football/soccer as Mathieu knowingly looking on. In the flashback, the naive and love-struck Mathieu was totally captivated by Cédric as he sang and danced in the buff at the beach, the post-depression, wiser and more mature Mathieu (something Pierre didn't fail to notice), once again sitting on a beach, now saw the side of Pierre that he knows he wouldn't find in Cédric.
I don't dare to say my interpretation is THE interpretation. But I hate to see people dismiss scenes as pointless and boring, went on to accuse the movie has no plot and provides no answer when the very scenes they dismiss provide the clues they are looking for. For that, I feel I have to put down my view.