You’ll Get Over It is melodrama redeemed by subtlety and adept acting. The script, written by Vincent Molina, is intelligent and truthful, and if it never exactly transports us to the higher realms, it has a grace and precision that carries the story without resorting to the usual, overwrought tactics you might expect from a film dealing with teenagers and homophobia. The pace is fairly quick, there are silences, but for the most part the information comes fast and steady, and the dry delivery is just right, I’m thinking, for what must certainly qualify as “loaded material.“
It’s always a pleasure (and far too rare) when a movie assumes we’re smart enough to get certain details without having them spelled out for us; there aren’t a lot of tears, but the pain comes through. We see it in Vincent’s red, swollen eyes, the way he huddles alone in bed in contrast to his mom and dad, his two best friends (Stephane and Noemie) making love. The restraint in You’ll Get Over It is similar to Bergman’s but doesn’t seem quite as clinical. As if director Fabrice Cazaneuve is taking great pains to preserve our hero’s dignity. And to avoid pity.
Vincent (Julien Baumgartner) is a high school swimming champion who is outed when some students spot him consorting with a queer outsider who has just transferred from another school. They confront him as he leaves Vincent’s apartment, and when they get aggressive, he punches them back, taking no shit whatsoever. This alone is worth the price of admission. The next day they paint, “Vincent is a fag!” on one of the walls inside the school and word travels quickly throughout the community. Suddenly Vincent, who is one of the schools most popular jocks, is ostracized, driven from the men’s locker room and derided by his classmates.
Cazaneuve makes a number of very wise decisions here. While eminently likable Vincent is no saint, he’s clearly favored by his parents over his older brother, and just as likely to mock “pansies” while clowning in the showers as the rest of the guys. We even begin to wonder if he’s using Noemie (perhaps unconsciously) as a beard. If he were in denial, even to himself, if he weren’t in one sense passing, it would make him seem pathetic, more like a martyr. By making Vincent more fallible, his isolation and loneliness become more accessible, more sympathetic. And the resulting treatment after he’s exposed almost justifies his secrecy. He loses the status he previously took for granted as a perceived heterosexual male.
A very powerful aspect of You’ll Get Over It was the ripple effect Vincent’s orientation has on the people in his life. His girlfriend, his best buddy, his brother, his parents, his English teacher, even his paramour on “the wrong side of town.” Noemie (Julia Maraval) is beginning to wonder just what’s going on between them, Stephane (Francois Comar) is able to connect with Vincent, finally, in a way he can appreciate, his parents agonize over the best course of action, and his English teacher vacillates between self-preservation and advocacy.
In the hands of a different director, or less nuanced actors, this material might have been corny or lurid or super sudsy-soapy. Instead we get a genuine feel for the chain of events when trauma comes about in one boy’s life. The intense rage, sorrow, betrayal, estrangement, helplessness that’s felt without banging on it like a gong.
The character of Benjamin (Jeremie Elkaim) the scraggly, outsider rebel is key to the plot. He’s almost an anti-hero (and enfant terrible’) exposing the pettiness and cowardice of the other students. He senses chemistry between he and Vincent from the first moment their eyes lock, and subsequently, unwittingly leads to Vincent’s exposure. The former golden boy will be asked to exhibit truly heroic behavior, walking a lonely, excruciating path, in essence, exchanging places with Benjamin. Ironically, it’s Benjamin who entices Vincent and then, turns him down. At first we despise Benjamin because he seems almost criminally stupid, cavalier. Perhaps sinister. But then we start to understand his worst supposed flaw is to be unashamed of his queer nature. Well, that and assuming the rest of the world has caught up to him.
You’ll Get Over It will not placate you with easy answers. Nor will it leave you with all the frayed ends tied neatly in a bow. It will however, offer smart, intriguing, provocative ideas to consider in a world where (despite reaching the 21st Century) hate-crimes are blatantly promoted from the pulpit, teen suicides are still highest in the queer community and gay marriage is arguably the most divisive issue in the impending presidential election.