A drama of poor, teenage mums navigating life both within and outside Belgium’s social care system, Young Mothers hardly sounds like the Dardenne brothers – the continent’s premiere social-realist Loachians – stretching themselves. Yet, after their descents into more melodramatic, ‘controversial’ territories with the recent Tori and Lokita, Young Ahmed, and The Unknown Girl found the brothers pretty far from their best form, a return to a relative comfort zone is not just very welcome – it pays off in spades. Quiet and unadorned, it’s their most emotionally effective work in a decade or more, honest and empathetic and impressively hopeful.
An intimate ensemble piece, Young Mothers follows four teenagers from broken, chaotic homes (three already mothers, one heavily pregnant) living together in a monitored group home set up to help them start their lives as parents on the best foot possible. The Dardennes jump between the intersecting stories and tragedies of each, from the pregnant and terrified Jessica (Babette Verbeek), barely coping with the trauma of her abandonment by her own mother to Ariane (Janaina Halloy), the cleverest and most clear-eyed of the bunch who is looking to have her baby taken in by a rich foster family.
There is a true, heavy sadness permeating much of Young Mothers, mostly drawn from just how young its leads are; the Dardennes do excellent work in really writing them as children, and the performances skilfully match. This does mean that they can be irritating, as any realistic teenager is, but it’s a frustration born from profound empathy – how can we expect consistent rational behaviour and clever decision-making from those who have been so abjectly failed in their own lives before they’ve even had a chance to reach adulthood. These girls are never judged, whether it’s by the film itself or in-universe by each other or the staff at the group home, and this grace is very moving.
And what of the young fathers and young grandmothers (tellingly, there are zero young grandfathers in the picture, no men willing to take real responsibility) that necessarily form a part of these girls’ worlds? Well, aside from the lovely boyfriend of recovering addict Julie (Elsa Houben), with whom she shares real kindness and patience and practical forward thinking as they get jobs and make plans for living together independently, they’re mostly pieces of shit. Neglectful and violent mothers sit alongside boyfriends who abuse every bit of privilege they’ve got to leave the mothers of their children alone in this world, and it’s heartbreaking to watch the girls debase themselves to ask almost nothing of these should-be family members and still not get it. Most desperate of all is Perla (Lucie Laruelle), who tries everything to get her petty criminal boyfriend to care even a little bit about her and their baby to absolutely no avail.
It’s all building to a bittersweet ending, where some of the girls find hope but others seem fated to continue the cycles of neglect and abuse that have defined their lives. Young Mothers is never cruel but, as all good Dardennes films must be, it is resolutely realistic and honest; these girls are in a situation with no right answers, but in reaching to do their best, there is a great emotional force.
Jack Blackwell – Film Reviews 