Water Lilies (Céline Sciamma, 2007)

Adèle Haenel and Pauline Acquart in Water Lilies

Cast: Pauline Acquart, Louise Blachère, Adèle Haenel, Warren Jacquin, Christel Baras, Marie Gili-Pierre, Alice de Lencquesaing, Claire Pierrat, Barbara Renard, Esther Sironneau, Jérémie Steib, Yvonne Villemaire, Christophe Vandevelde. Screenplay: Céline Sciamma. Cinematography: Crystel Fournier. Production design: Gwendel Bescond. Film editing: Julien Lacheray. Music: Jean-Baptiste de Laubier.

I admit to a certain queasiness about watching Water Lilies, with its almost too intimate exploration of the lives of teenage girls, including some nudity. Céline Sciamma of course wants us to feel that way, to make us aware of these adolescent bodies as well as the souls that inhabit them. One girl, Marie (Pauline Acquart), is skinny and awkward; another, Anne (Louise Blachère), is on the verge of being overweight; and the third, Florine (Adèle Haenel), is flat-out beautiful. All of them spend much of their time at the swimming pool, where Florine is the star of a group of synchronized swimmers, and Anne coaches a group of beginners. Marie is the hanger-on who watches the other girls with a too-eager eye. At the film's start, she and Anne are close, but as Marie becomes involved with Florine, the two drift apart. There is a pivotal boy in the ensemble, the handsome François (Warren Jacquin), whom Anne desires -- at one point she she sees him looking at her naked in the locker room; she doesn't cover up in embarrassment but is rather pleased, and begins to try to win him. But François is after Florine, who strikes a deal with Marie: She'll let Marie watch the group practicing if she'll help her sneak out of the house at night to meet with François. Eventually, a different relationship develops between Marie and Florine. Sciamma choreographs this pas de quatre well, but there's something a little too formulaic and voyeuristic about the film, which doesn't resolve itself into significance. Still, its portrait of the sexual confusion of adolescence is often achingly real.

Girlhood (Céline Sciamma, 2014)

Karidja Touré in Girlhood

Cast: Karidja Touré, Assa Sylla, Lindsay Karamoh, Mariétou Touré, Idrissa Diabaté, Simina Soumaré, Dielika Coulibaly, Cyril Mendy, Djibril Gueye, Binta Diop, Chance N'Guessan. Screenplay: Céline Sciamma. Cinematography: Crystel Fournier. Production design: Thomas Grézaud. Film editing: Julien Lacheray. Music: Jean-Baptiste de Laubier.

Girlhood is an altogether absorbing look at young lives in the Paris banlieue, which might also be a description of Mathieu Kassovitz's celebrated 1995 film La Haine. But the difference between the two is striking and important: La Haine was about young men, a Jew, a Black, and an Arab, and worked out its story a little self-consciously as a commentary on the relations among three major ethnic groups. Its writer-director and its three principals were male, with all the implications of privilege that suggests. But Girlhood was written and directed by a woman, and its protagonist is female, a Black teenager named Marieme (Karidja Touré), who is determined to go her own way in life. Told that she doesn't have the grades to go to high school but should choose vocational education instead, Marieme rebels, determined to find her way against the odds. She falls in with a group of girls -- the French title was Bande de Filles, which might be translated Gang of Girls -- and adopts their ways, which include a little shoplifting, a little bullying of smaller kids for money, and excursions into Paris for the bright lights of the big city. They also include fights with other gangs, and when the leader of Marieme's gang, Lady (Assa Sylla), loses a fight and is embarrassed, Marieme, who has become known as "Vic," short for "Victory," takes on the winner of that fight and triumphs, stripping off the other girl's top and using a knife to cut away her bra as a trophy. Still, she must face the outside world. Her mother, Asma (Binta Diop), works as a maid in a large hotel and arranges for Marieme to take a job there, but she turns it down. Her life at home becomes intolerable when she sleeps with her boyfriend, Ismaël, and is beaten for being a slut by her older brother, Djibril (Cyril Mendy). So she goes to work as a runner for Abou (Djibril Gueye), a drug dealer, which gives her an income, a place to live, and some glimpse of the high life. But the end of the film finds her still solitary, still facing obstacles. Girlhood is a smart, sad movie with a deeply engaging performance by Touré, and a strong supporting cast.