Stella (Sylvie Verheyde, 2008)

[martin]

I saw Sylvie Verheyde's Stella at Cinemateket, Copenhagen as a "feature of the month" earlier in 2010 (towards the end of 2009, Cinemateket introduced a new concept of having a "feature of the month" - dedicated to new films, which were somehow too small to get a proper distribution in Denmark).

Stella is a wonderful film about an eleven year old girl in Paris in the 1970's. She's not good at school but she's much more mature than her classmates - probably because of her upbringing at her parent's inn/bar amongst lodging drunks and misfits.

The story is told from the girl's POV with some irony, and the actors - especially the kids - are marvellous. The period setting is also nice. The film is perhaps somewhat in the vein of My Life as a Dog, although with less irony, and not quite as sentimental either. It also reminds me in a way of Diane Kurys' La baule-les-Pins (1990), not least because of the autobiographic element (I believe Stella is partly autobiographic, and set at a time when Sylvie Verheyde herself was 11 years old). I'm not sure if Verheyde can be considered an auteur but I enjoyed this film almost just as much as any film with kids by Truffaut, Pialat, Malle or Miller. It's probably not a timelss classic but it's sweet, subdued, and unpretentious.

I don't know if there are any English-friendly dvd's but it's released on dvd in at least France and Italy. I bought the French dvd (without English subs) and found some excellent English subs on the net (although not in sync, which I've corrected manually).

[gokinsmen]

I've actually been meaning to watch this, but like you said, the subs were out of sync (annoyingly, they're fine for the first five minutes and then derail). Any way you could upload your corrected subs (rapidshare or the like)?

[martin]

No problem. Subs adjusted for 25fps:
http://rapidshare.com/files/419735176/S ... fps.en.srt" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[gokinsmen]

Awesome, thanks. My French is almost half-functional so I understood enough to know it was worth tracking down proper subs.