Writer-director Lola Quivoron’s debut, Rodeo, belongs to a recent class of French films made by and about young women, with stories that combine the coming-of-age genre — what the French call un film d’initiation — with elements of a Hollywood thriller or horror flick. They tend to be first features and are often highly stylized ones at that, launching the burgeoning careers of filmmakers like Julia Ducournau (Raw), Rebecca Zlotowski (Belle épine), Léa Mysius (Ava) and Coralie Fargeat (Revenge)
Rodeo very much fits that mold, following a rebellious young thief from the banlieue named Julia (newcomer Julie Ledru) who infiltrates a gang of urban dirt-bike riders for her own pleasure, then finds herself caught up in a dangerous criminal enterprise.
The clandestine motorcycle milieu was already the subject of Quivron’s 2016 short, Au loin, Baltimore (Faraway Baltimore), which featured a group of fearless young bikers who risked their lives popping wheelies and practicing other stunts banned from French roadways. (The title of the short was inspired by the 2013 Baltimore-set documentary 12 O’Clock Boys — whose director, Lofty Nathan, is coincidentally screening his new feature in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard the same day as Rodeo.)
Working with co-writer Antonia Buresi — who also stars as Ophélie, the wife of the gang’s imprisoned kingpin, Domino (Sébastien Schroeder) – Quivron plunges us into a thrill-seeking and sometimes deadly world that’s also abundantly a man’s world, with Julia the perennial outsider trying to fit in. Using a cast of real bikers and capturing their stunts in eye-popping ways, especially during the film’s opening section, the director paints a vibrant portrait of a community that survives purely on guts, gas and the thefts of pricey motor bikes that are resold to unsuspecting buyers.
The authenticity of the dirt-bike milieu is the movie’s best asset, and if Rodeo were a documentary it would have worked just fine. The problems start when Quivoron tries to turn all of this into an original and convincing story, at which point her film swerves off course, especially in a third act involving a big heist that predictably doesn’t go as planned. We never know much about Julia beyond that she’s a fiend for motorcycles (referred to in the movie using the French slang term bécanes, which confused me at first because I thought everyone was talking about bacon), and it’s unclear why she’s so willing to get involved with a group of guys who can’t really stand having her around, serving a crime boss who seems like an absolute d-bag.
From the opening scene, when we see Julia fighting with her brother at home and storming outside to steal a new Honda from a gullible seller, Rodeo drops us right into the action. But the film is practically all action and zero character — except, that is, for a subplot involving Julia’s growing affection for Ophélie, which seems to come out of nowhere and then goes back to where it came from. It’s clear Julia is looking for a surrogate family, but since we really never know what happened with her own family it’s hard to understand why that’s the case, and the whole thing remains murky.
Likewise, a subplot involving one member of the gang who, again for unclear reasons, has a bone to pick with Julia and threatens her with anonymous text messages, seems like it’s been added on just to have more story elements. Quivoron may feel at home in the dirt-bike world she depicts, but her film often feels phony because she can’t graft anything onto that world except clichés drawn from other movies.
The performances by a cast of mostly non-actors tend to all be of the same note, although Ledru does have a fierce energy and level of agression that barely lets up. Only fellow gear head, Kais (Yanis Lafki), who takes a liking to Julia early on, is capable of showing a little tenderness, and some of the film’s best scenes involve the two pulling off a few bike thefts together.
Rodeo was shot by Raphaël Vandenbussche (My Best Part), whose handheld lensing, particularly in some of the early sequences, can be a bit much to handle, although he captures all the bike sequences in gorgeous fluid images that are thrilling to watch. An electro score by Kelman Duran is combined with several French and American trap songs that add to the trippy ambiance of Julia and her crew’s endless weed smoking and joyrides.
With a slot in the Un Certain Regard sidebar, the film should see some buzz and attention in France, where neither 12 O’Clock Boys nor its 2020 fictional remake, Charm City Kings, were ever released. But it may have a harder time breaking out internationally, especially in territories like North America where its twists and turns feel a tad familiar.
Director: Lola Quivoron
Screenplay: Lola Quivoron, Antonia Buresi
Cast: Julie Ledru, Yanis Lafki, Antonia Buresi, Louis Sotton, Junior Correia, Ahmed Hamdi, Dave Nasaman Okebwan, Cody Schroeder, Sébastien Schroeder
Producer: Charles Gilibert
Cinematography: Raphaël Vandenbussche
Production design: Gabrielle Desjean
Costume design: Rachèle Raoult
Editing: Rafael Torres Calderon
Music: Kelman Duran
Production companies: CG Cinéma (France)
World sales: Les Films du Losange
In French
110 minutes
