Petite Maman review: Daughter time travels to meet her mother in a spectacular French mystery

4/5

STORY: Eight-year-old Nelly has a chance meeting with her mother when she was eight, and they grow more fond of each other than ever.    

Watch the trailer here

REVIEW: Céline Sciamma’s painting-like film Petite Maman is everything beautiful. Steeped in magic realism, the narrative is charming, compassionate and profound, with a tinge of melancholy. Eight-year-old Nelly (Joséphine Sanz) meets her eight-year-old mother, Marion (Gabrielle Sanz), as she time travels into her mother’s past and tells her that she is her daughter.

The story begins in a hospital ward, where Nelly’s beloved grandmother (Margot Abascal) has just died, and the now 31-year-old Marion (Nina Meurisse) is vacating the room before they can make a trip to Margot’s home and pack up her stuff there. They are accompanied by Nelly’s father (Stéphane Varupenne). 

Warmly-lit interiors, low whispers and quiet breakfasts set the stage for what is going to be a trip down memory lane, quite literally. Nelly is less expressive but way too sensible for her age. She doesn’t take long to comprehend that 31-year-old Marion is grieving and disturbed, or maybe sad about something else too that’s not revealed to her. But she feels her pain. She is curious about the little childhood stories - the ones we hear during our formative years; those that stay with us like tiny treasure troves where we love transporting ourselves back to.     

After Marion suddenly leaves one morning, Nelly goes for a walk in the backyard of the house where she finds a girl who looks exactly like herself busy putting together tree branches trying to build a hut in the middle of the forest. This matched the description of a childhood experience that her mother tells her often about. Nelly has just met her petite maman. 

A cinematic gem, Céline carefully quilts pages from some beloved book that exudes imagination, innocence and love. Two little girls - who are fully aware of what they mean to each other - dwell in dream-like sequences - making memories or reliving them. Much like sisters or best friends, they grow quite fond of each other - eating and sleeping together, making pancakes in the kitchen and even rowing a boat.

The many moods of the film are impressively portrayed through a palette of pastel hues and subtle sounds. The endearing moments of Nelly keeping her grandmother’s stick, playing paddle ball in the backyard, pelting tree seeds or helping her father shave off his beard are all the small joys of life that make you believe in magic. The underlying message of the narrative is also to answer or at least acknowledge the questions that everyone is asking themselves.  

A splendid script and powerful characterisation are the film’s strong points, but one cannot, just cannot undermine the power of imagination that has made all this possible. Twins Joséphine and Gabrielle deserve a special mention for their stirring performances and Céline, of course, for creating this spectacular piece of art. 

VERDICT: A must-watch not only for its French fairytale charm, but because of the manner in which the story explores the mother-daughter bond beyond the ordinary. 

*Reema Gowalla is an independent arts and culture journalist, who mostly writes about theatre and independent cinema, and sometimes also delves into culinary heritage.