The Courageous: Parenting, Poverty and a Memorable Mother
By Liz Braun
Rating: A
Jasmin Gordon has created a tiny perfect drama about motherhood in her first feature, The Courageous.
The film centres on Jule (Ophelia Kolb), a single mother on the edge of society with three children she’s trying to raise properly —poverty and a criminal ankle bracelet notwithstanding.
Jule and her children live in a picturesque, wealthy town set like a jewel in the Valais region of Switzerland. The first discordant note in the story comes when mom grabs fruit from a tree in a parking lot, feeding some to herself and some to her children with a big smile and a sense of adventure — except you sense the need behind the gesture.
Jule leaves her children in a cafe and goes off “just for five minutes” — ordering one glass of lemonade to keep her three kids occupied while she’s gone. It’s not long before the waitress decides to call in security about potentially abandoned children.
The children — Claire (Jasmine Kalisz Saurer), Loic (Paul Besnier), and Sami (Arthur Devaux) decide that walking home is just what they should do. It’s a dangerous venture, but they get home eventually.
Mom shows up later, when all the kids are fast asleep.
What exactly the issues are is never entirely clear in The Courageous. There are hints at what has gone before, glimmers of past trauma, but nothing specific — and Mom continues to try to set things right.
There is no father figure in the picture. One day Jule takes the kids to see a decrepit house that’s up for sale and tells them she’s buying the house for them. They’ll never have to move again. Jule has an idea of how she’ll get that house, although her approach is dubious.
How Jule — and by extension, her children — is marginalized by others is subtle but constant in the narrative. There’s obviously some minor crime in her background, and she’s poor and a single parent — all things that can be held against her.
People are condescending; they are endlessly judgemental and unforgiving. She works hard to keep up appearances. Just what women are up against in the eyes of the world is underlined in a heartrending scene that sees Jule treat her kids to a shoplifted cake she’s disguised as home-made.
The Courageous is a disturbing film in the sense that one sees how close Jule gets to creating a proper life for her children — but she keeps falling short. She and the kids are still included in community and classroom life, but their presence is precarious.
So, while her children are still invited to birthday parties, for example, Jule has to shoplift whatever gift they bring the child having the party.
The Courageous works thanks to a superb script and fully engaging performances from Kolb and the young actors who play her children. So much is conveyed here in the most subtle of gestures, in the way the children take care of one another, in the way Jule lies glibly and often to protect her children from harsh truths about their life.
The Courageous, which is in French with English subtitles, is a powerful film; it had its world debut at TIFF 2024.
The Courageous. Directed by Jasmin Gordon, written by Julien Bouissoux and Jasmin Gordon. Starring Ophelia Kolb, Jasmine Kalisz Saurer, and Paul Besnier. In Toronto’s Cineplex Varsity April 18.