The Beautiful Person

A film set in a school in Paris. Junie, who has lost her mother, changes schools and joins her cousin's class. She draws attention at once; Otto from the class falls in love with her and she accepts the relationship. Then comes Nemours, the Italian teacher. Something begins between them and Junie tries to hold it down. The question at the centre is not fidelity but whether it is possible to make yourself unhappy knowingly. The source is a novel from the seventeenth century: Madame de La Fayette's The Princess of Clèves. Honoré has moved the story from the court to a school; the letters have become phone messages, but the scenes of jealousy and confession stay as they are in the book. The texture comes from shooting on sixteen millimetre; the visible grain is a deliberate choice. Léa Seydoux plays Junie, one of her first leading parts. Louis Garrel plays Nemours. Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet and Esteban Carvajal Alegria are in the cast. Christophe Honoré directed. An interesting match for anyone who likes French youth drama and classical adaptation. Before you watch, know this: the film treats the relationship between a teacher and a student without distance, and that reads as uncomfortable now.