On Fire (2006) User Reviews

A long, long horse ride

[incitatus-org · 4 September 2006]

Adolescent Livia finds herself in the south of France, in the dust, after falling off her horse with an older man, a fireman, leaning over her. As he helps her, she falls in love. Summer is kicking in, it's hot and emotions are flaring up.

Watching Livia ride around town on her horse, seeing the other teenagers passing their time idly and people going about their business is what fills most of this movie. Rest assured that the charm and seeming slow-motion of life in the village is somewhat justified towards the end, but it is a long wait. Ca Brule is like a Haiku stretched out as long as possible, and whether you consider it to have snapped or not will largely depend on your state of mind on going in. Beauty is certainly there, but there are merits to be found for one of the great attributes to the Haiku - it's short(-er).

A Nutshell Review: On Fire

[DICK STEEL · 4/10 · 10 October 2008]

If I could ask director Claire Simon a question, it would be where they had culled the footage of the extensive raging forest fire, if they had not set it ablaze themselves. It probably is the highlight of the movie, after sitting through a plodding pace of a story about a hot blooded teenager going about her life of idle holiday, and being infatuated with a fireman who had attended to her when she fell off her horse.

Livia (Camille Varenne) plays that teenage girl who falls for an older man, and lives her life being in quite a daze, spending long hours riding her horse around town, ridiculing and being ridiculed by peers, and contemplating joining the fire brigade just to be close to the man of her desires, Jean Susini (Gilbert Melki). It's quite episodic in its narrative, dwelling on her riding escapades, her impulsive and innovative streak in trying to get herself close to her man, the strange sexual games she plays with friends, followed by the documentary like admiration for forests going up in flames.

Yes, while you can try to find meaning within her journeys in and around town, as well as that in the lingering shots of fire fire burning bright, but I'd rather not bother. It's quite indulgent, and seriously the more disturbing aspect of it is the nagging feeling whether that fire was real, and in the name of film-making, whether it was really sacrificed for celluloid, working into the plot of having the girl wrack her brains at the ultimate sending of signals to her beau.

Gilbert Melki did provide some credible performance as the man caught between the stability of his life with his wife and child, and the opportunity of having a Lolita throw herself at him, with signals ranging from off the cuff visits at work, and suggestive phone messages. He struggles to find some sense in his dilemma, which shouldn't even beg the question to begin with, if he's resolute. Other than his character, the rest are quite one-dimensional, and personally I don't find any common ground, nor emphatize with Livia in her strange pursuit, and very alienated character who seemed to be rather happy when alone riding her horse, a source of comfort and strength, soon forgotten when her father takes it away supposedly for championship training.

On Fire trots way too slowly for the sake of doing so, but if there's any merit in this movie, it's that it portrays and transmits the sense and feeling of boredom really well - you'll feel every minute of this overlong movie.

An emotional and symbolic film

[greimalkin2 · 10/10 · 10 July 2011]

Ca Brule is all interiority and symbolism. It's almost like a test for emotional and semiotic intelligence. In order to enjoy (or even follow) this film, you need to be able to read things on a literary/ symbolic level, and you need to read a person's face and imagine what they might be feeling (in short, empathize). People who don't have these skills will be "bored" by this film and think "nothing is happening." It is not difficult, however; the symbols it uses are very basic. The horse stands for man and sexuality or physicality; fire evokes emotion, passion, and raw feelings. The character is simple as well-- a somewhat spoiled, definitely self-absorbed girl who likes a man and has a lot of time on her hands.

Watching this film requires you to sit and think for awhile about this character and what is good or bad, advantageous or perilous about her. You need a bit of your own interior life too-- it asks you to "bring" something to the film. It is actually more engaging and rewarding when a film is like this.