Consent: a disappointing adaptation (critic)

By bringing to the screen Vanessa Springora's book which depicts the sexual predation exercised by Gabriel Matzneff on a young teenager, Vanessa Filho gives in to a lot of heaviness.

This autumn, The consent did well in French cinemas, attracting more than 600,000 curious people despite its difficult subject and its ban on children under 12 years old. A success due in part to a TikTok phenomenon !

Vanessa Filho's drama with Kim Higelin, Laetitia Casta and Jean-Paul Rouve will return this Tuesday evening on Canal +. An adaptation to see? If it's not as strong as the novel, it's worth it for at least two scenes. Here is our review.

Released in early 2020, the book The consent had caused a sensation with its description of the influence suffered in the 1980s by Vanessa Springora (author of the text), who at the age of 13 became the lover of a renowned writer (Gabriel Matzneff, not named in the work) having 35 years older than her and defending sexual relations between adults and minors.

By adapting this poignant story for the cinema, Vanessa Filho (Angel Face) emphasizes the physical brutality of this abusive relationship and immerses us in a nightmare atmosphere. The inner voice of the narrator, which was the strength of the book, is thus abandoned and it is on the contrary the manipulative voice of Matzneff (this time named in the film) which resonates at the opening. While she evacuates several interesting aspects of the book (such as the complex relationship that Vanessa maintains with her absent father), the filmmaker insists on the morbid crudeness of the sexual relations between this teenager and this perverted fifty-year-old played by an astonishing Jean-Paul Rouve.

If the film relies heavily on the figure of this writer who exerts a strong seduction on those around him, its shaky staging strays too far from the height of view of the book and does not find the liberating glow of Vanessa Springora's text. There remain a few striking sequences around the dysfunctional bond between Vanessa (played by Kim Higelin) and her mother (played by Laetitia Casta) and a frontal denunciation of sexual predators.

Trailer :

Consent entries boosted by TikTok buzz?