My Summer of Love (2004) (Pawel Pawlikowski)

It’s a cruel summer indeed. “My Summer of Love” stands as almost a scornful swipe against its title. Writer-director Pawel Pawlikowski shows the impudence of being that age when romance is almost as grave as life and death and important enough to be swept away in a tide of hormones and irrationality. In a small idyllic village, just north of England, a snapshot of an intoxicating and sultry femme relationship between a naïve native and a worldly, cultured out-of-towner starts to bloom just as the hillside flowers start to.

Seductive and sensual, Pawlikowski’s naturalist tones and earthy colours complement the summer’s languorous transience. Class warfare, religious transgressions and misandry bubble below the surface but strong performances from each of its main cast give a trenchant sense of knowing of painful adolescence to the film during a fateful event of a young girl’s life.

Gravelly voiced, booze-guzzling young Mona (Nathalie Press) craves for a distraction this season. Her brother, Phil (Paddy Considine) is an ex-convict, born-again Christian seeking emotional refuge in the town’s sect of charismatic Christians. When we first meet him, he drains the bottles of alcohol, intent on making their bar a new haven for his religious congregations. Naturally, Mona spends more time with the girl she met during a balmy afternoon on the grassy knolls. Almost chivalrously plucking her out of the dense reality she faces during the summer, Tamsin (Emily Blunt) strides up to her on a white horse and introduces her to a different life.

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