User Reviews

"Avant les rues" is exceptional first by its ambition. Filming entirely in a remote Native Canadian tribe? In the Atikamekw language? Using non-professional actors? Including long, static scenes showing people singing? There are so many ways this film could have easily become a disaster. But it mostly succeeds, *because* of its original approach. In some aspects, it is less interesting, and this happens mostly when the director (Chloé Leriche) inserts herself and her unoriginal political views in what is otherwise a fascinating enterprise. The tone of the movie is contemplative, which I personally appreciate. It helps that Leriche has a kin artistic eye. Although she doesn't try to produce conventionally beautiful pictures, the shots are always interesting (the forest, the bodies, the houses...). At some point while watching it, it came to my mind that the camera was always right where it needed to be. The movie's depiction of boredom in the village, dead-end jobs (on the lucky days that there are some jobs to be done) and unattended children is pitch-perfect. Although it is frank about this reality, it is nonetheless not depressive. There is plenty of love and friendship and that's ultimately what saves the main character, Shawnouk. So then, what doesn't work? First, Shawnouk's transgression, what is supposed to put the whole story in motion, is way too light. (SPOILER) Shawnouk accepts to help a bad guy robbing some houses. When they are surprised by the owner of one of them, the bad guy wants to kill the witness. Shawnouk bravely defends the man, shielding him with his body, and in the scuffle that ensues, a shot is accidentally fired that kills the bad guy. It is difficult to understand why Shawnouk would be so depressed about this, to the point that he contemplates suicide. The redemption would have felt much more genuine if Shawnouk had done something really bad - if he had killed someone who did not deserve it, or if he had done so deliberately, not accidentally. Secondly... Leriche couldn't refrain from using the movie as a vehicle for her standard-issued, boring white-guilt political views. It starts with a quote from Hubert Reeves at the start of the movie, which comes up as pretentious. And then, the only non-native Québécois in the movie is... the psychopath who wants to kill the home owner. In case you don't get Leriche's point, here it is: Native Canadians are good, pure, nature-loving people whereas white men... are the evil that corrupts everything. This is a point that she reinforced in all the interviews she did at around the premiere of the movie, by the way. If it sounds like the simplistic/naive speech of the common white urban leftist, it's because it is: Leriche is *not* a Native Canadian. She is a white Montreal-based photographer (a very talented one). And although she made a genuine effort to learn about life in the Atikamekw tribe where the film was shot, she remains primarily a tourist. The more she tries to insert politics into what is and should have stayed an intimate story, the more she lowers the force and impact of her movie. Still, the film definitely deserves to be seen, for its images, the great actors, the Atikamekw language and because of how little we know about people who are our neighbors.