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It\u2019s not immediately apparent how courtly intrigue figures in \u201cA Prince,\u201d Pierre Creton\u2019s spellbinding French pastoral drama, though sex, death and domination hang palpably in the film\u2019s crisp, Normandy air.<\/p>\n
Creton, a veteran director working at the margins of France\u2019s film industry, looks to the divine powers and chivalric codes that fuel swords-and-shields epics like \u201cGame of Thrones,\u201d but whittles these elements down to a mysterious essence. A subtly medieval score \u2014 distinguished by the thrum of a lute and composed by Jozef van Wissem \u2014 draws out a surreal dimension. Eventually, the film shifts into explicitly sexual and mythological terrain with a B.D.S.M. edge, and the score keeps pace, taking on a folk metal vibe.<\/p>\n
The story is slippery by design, loosely tracking the gay coming-of-age of an apprentice gardener, Pierre-Joseph, played for the most part by Antoine Pirotte. Creton, who also works as a gardener in real life, plays the older version of Pierre-Joseph, so \u201cA Prince\u201d also reads as an autofictional memory piece.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Throughout the film, a series of wordless and seductively austere tableaux, Pierre- Joseph forms bonds with various individuals in his rural community. Multiple narrators, including Fran\u00e7oise Lebrun (\u201cThe Mother and the Whore<\/a>\u201d), speak in retrospect, as if looking back from the afterlife at the characters onscreen. These connections are tangled: for instance, Lebrun voices Fran\u00e7oise Brown (played by Manon Schaap), the head of a horticulture school. Yet Lebrun also plays the onscreen version of Pierre-Joseph\u2019s mother.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The effect may seem frustrating at first, but it ultimately feeds into the kind of alternative, communal lifestyle that the film showcases so beautifully.<\/p>\n Pierre-Joseph eventually comes to form a throuple with Alberto (Vincent Barr\u00e9) and Adrien (Pierre Barray), his mentors. The naked bodies of these much older gentleman appear suggestively weathered next to their younger lover\u2019s sprightly form. Yet there is no mention of taboo. That passion could bloom in such spontaneous and unexpected forms is part of this enigmatic film\u2019s potency.<\/p>\n A Prince<\/strong>
Not rated. In French, with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 22 minutes. In theaters.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n