Holy Cow
Did you know that cheese requires you to plunge your arms into a bubbling cauldron of boiling milk and scoop out the curds with a cloth that’s tied to your body? I’m sure I did but the visual reminder ruled out cheesemaking as a possible vocation for me after seeing Holy Cow, the debut feature from French director Louise Courvoisier. Winner of the youth prize in the Un Certain Regard category at Cannes, the film is a coming-of-age drama about a young man who learns that achieving adulthood is like making Comté cheese; finicky and likely to burn you but ultimately, mild and slightly sweet.
The young man is Anthony but he goes by Totone (newcomer Clément Faveau) and he passes the time like any 18-year-old who lives in the French countryside; partying with his best mates Francis (Dimitry Baudry) and Jean-Yves (Mathis Bernard) and watching the latter tear up the race track in his stock car. By day he works on his dad’s dairy farm and by night, he’s off starting fights with rival dairy workers, sobering up at bus shelters and sheepishly leaving girls’ houses after drunkenly failing to consummate one night stands. It’s clear alcohol plays a big part in Totone’s enjoyment. And unfortunately, the same can be said for his father.
One night after a rowdy gathering and one too many drinks, Totone’s dad attempts to drive himself home but instead, slams into a tree, leaving Totone the sole guardian of his 7-year-old sister Claire (Luna Garret). With no one to help him but his two equally immature friends, Totone does his best to raise Claire, only to discover that having a dependant is expensive work. So he gets a job at the dairy farm belonging to his rivals and while the boys aren’t thrilled, their sister Marie-Lise (Maiwene Barthelemy) feels differently.
Marie-Lise is older than Totone and has her own dairy farm, making her something of a dream girl in his eyes. From her he learns the distinction between sex and intimacy, and maturity seems like it may be arriving early. At the same time, Totone and the gang discover that there’s a massive cash prize for making Comté, so they set to work on bypassing more realistic earning opportunities and start stealing milk from the neighbours in order to hone their cheesemaking abilities.
What I like about Holy Cow is its honesty. The main cast comprises mostly first time actors scouted from agricultural shows and stock car races, which lends a level of authenticity and texture to the film. It’s shot in soft, natural light and there’s even a real calf delivery, which is about the most dramatic thing that happens. In any other film, Totone and the gang’s cheese ambitions would be the focus of the narrative, culminating in a final cheese off in which they would either win, or valiantly be crowned Best New Talent (or something). In Courvoisier’s film, bureaucracy is a real and destructive stumbling block, just as it would be for any real life person who randomly decides to make an award-winning cheese with no prior experience.
There may not be a whole bunch else to plunder beneath the film’s lactose rich surface but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. The films I watched surrounding Holy Cow were Jacques Audiard’s hot mess Emilia Pérez, Ridley Scott’s two and a half hour slog Gladiator II and David Lynch’s Dune (enough said), rendering this 90-minute film about cheese and adulthood comparatively refreshing. Holy Cow is a mild and slightly sweet coming-of-age film about the carefully aged bonds of friendship, the rude shock of having to grow up and the reality that some things actually are out of reach for regular people. If there’s anything to take away, it’s that it’s not about the destination, but the cheese we make along the way.
Verdict:
☆☆☆½
Holy Cow is showing at Perth Festival from Jan 13th to Jan 19th. Take a Lacteeze beforehand.
