- Nineteen-year-old Liane auditions for the show “Miracle Island”. He sees it as his chance for social advancement, expressed through recognition and financial success. With passion and panache, the director paints a picture of youth, subordinated to the dictatorship of image and body, hypersexualization of girls and permanent presence on social media.
- “Wild Diamond” in cinemas from December 13. Watch the trailer!
Agathe Riedinger said in one of her interviews that she was fascinated by 19th-century French courtesans, for whom the choice of the oldest profession in the world was not only a result of the desire to escape poverty in order to survive, but also gave them a chance to enter the highest social class. After all, libertarian aristocratic France worshiped courtesans quite openly. Today’s luxury “escorts” also climb to the highest financial peak and look down on the little ones from Dubai’s skyscrapers while bathing in a bathtub of petrodollars. Glamor and fame are the new opium of the people.
19-year-old Liane (Malou Khébizi) lives in the seaside resort of Fréjus, which, through Riedinger’s lens, has little in common with the paradise of the Côte d’Azur. Her mother is an alcoholic, which once landed Liane in a nursing home. Now she takes care of her younger sister, who does everything to be physically like her. Sisters are like Dr. Evil and Mini-Me are perfect for TikTok. Liane invests every hard-earned money in Botox, implants and other plastic attributes of homo tiktocus. She can’t even afford a professional tattoo, so she gets a tattoo done on her stomach herself. The girl applies for a casting for a reality show under the revealing title “Miracle Island”, where he hears that there is a chance to perform, but he still has to fight for the fans on their social media.
Liane goes to great lengths to gather followers who (we see it on the boards dividing the subsequent chapters of the story) both support her and humiliate her with sexualized hate posts. However, her goal is clear – she wants to be a modern goddess. He wants to arouse desire and admiration with or without a filter. He wants to be at the top, like those who earn tens of thousands of euros for one post on Instagram. So she shoplifts, spends her last money on expensive dresses and gets involved with her boyfriend Nathan (Alexis Manenti), who promises to be her bodyguard. After all, a star must have a bodyguard, even if instead of walking along the seaside promenade he is walking along a crappy canal with a dry river. These are all filters that Liane puts on herself to shine on her smartphone screen. Just to earn glitter on another idiotic reality show among the sand and palm trees.
To achieve this However, she must expose herself first at the casting and then in front of a plastic surgeon. This part of the movie is the most interesting. Riedinger here follows the path of Andrea Arnold or even the Dardenne brothers. He looks at Liane with tenderness and sympathy, despite all the stupid things she will do for fame. What alternative does he have in a town that is deserted in the off-season? He is a bidok for whom no one wants to compose an elegy.
There is even a religious thread here. Liane is a believer and she prays very seriously, and it seems that this faith somehow pushes her to act. It’s a pity it doesn’t get developed. The juxtaposition of the pursuit of perfect corporeality with spiritual dilemmas begs to be explored. The girl’s sense of sin, who appears to be a virgin (though this is not stated explicitly), could also shed light on her personality. At one point – frustrated and resigned to waiting for a call from the producers – the girl is close to selling her body in a nightclub. What’s stopping her from doing this? Belief? Or maybe something else? We don’t know.
The French director does not reveal her clear position on Lane’s desire to appear in a stultifying reality show. Does the fulfillment of this dubious dream justify all methods of pursuing it? Should young girls have their femininity defined through the square window of InstaStory? I understand that Riedinger did not want to judge the actions of the young girls that Liane symbolizes. However, this does not change the fact that her assertiveness is irritating.
Magnus Von Horn w “Sweat” he was not afraid to put forward more expressive theses. Fortunately, much is made up for by the expressive and moving role of naturalist Malou Khebizi. Thanks to her exceptionally natural performance (she also played such a character in the short film Riedinger), you can believe in the desperation of a young girl from the margins of society who sees a chance to change her life and that of her sister only in subs and likes. He is not in the minority at all. That’s the scariest thought I’ve ever had after looking at this Instagram-cut diamond.
7/10
“Wild Diamond” (Diamant brut), dir. Agathe Riedinger, France 2024, distributor: Nowe Horyzonty Association, cinema premiere: December 13, 2024.