Blame it on Fidel

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm writing about another French movie...

Blame it on Fidel is a little more lively than some of the cinema Francais I've seen lately, mainly because the protaganist is a nine-year-old girl, Anna. Anna is dealing with the loss of her old, comfortable middle class life when her parents decide to take on new roles and jobs to support causes they believe in- Allende in Chile, and the women's lib movement in 1970 Paris.

The beauty of the movie is that nowhere along the way does the movie advertise a certain point of view. In fact, it explores the perspectives of Communism, Feminism, Catholicism, Greek mythology, Asian mythology, and various other philosophies. This might frustrate and confuse the average American movie viewer, but I always prefer a question mark to a period (or an exclamation mark) in these cases.

The movie, then, becomes about how we piece together our own philosophies, how we manage to meld things that sometimes clash, and how we deal with finding out the diasppointing truth about idealism. In this movie, as in life, there are no absolutes, and the right answers are only right if they're right for you.

It is, quite simply, beautifully and impressively done, and I love that all of this difficult material is dealt with through the eyes of a little girl. Because in the end, I think we all deal with these issues with the same naive, grudging, curious, and opinionated gusto as our heroine, Anna.

A nice thought-provoking look inside ourselves and our own worldviews. And it's on Netflix instant watch right now. Yay French movies!