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When casually asking someone how they are doing, most people aren’t actually seeking the true nuances of the interlocutor’s emotional state. The expectation is for the pleasantry to yield a quick, hollow response. Same goes for those who offer help to someone in times of distress, while tacitly anticipating the other person won’t cash in on the proposition. Vouching for genuine solidarity and not empty gestures, writer-director Louise Courvoisier’s first feature “Holy Cow,” a vivacious coming-of-ager set amid dairy farms in the French countryside, illustrates how individuals can meaningfully show up for one another.
To that end, Courvoisier centers on Totone (Clément Faveau), a scrawny 18-year-old with a perpetually furrowed brow living in the rural Jura region of eastern France, where the director grew up. That it’s a homegrown artist depicting the humble, yet rich lives of locals results in a portrayal that’s graciously humorous rather than patronizing or simplistically idealized. Totone’s carefree days drowned in beer, girl chasing, and free-spirit rides on his motorbike through open roads soon fade into the backburner when his father dies tragically leaving the teen to care for his adorable little sister Claire (Luna Garret).
In that moment of need, Totone realizes the adults who vowed to provide assistance weren’t prepared to deliver on their promise. Faveau’s peculiar visage and compact body resemble a young version of French character actor Dominique Pinon (“Delicatessen”). The fresh-faced performer, making his screen debut here, plays Totone as a puzzled kid shocked into growing up, but seems mostly interested in frolicking around. There’s a charming paradox to his persona, at once willing to pull his pants down in front of a crowd for a rowdy moment of immature joy, but responsible enough to take becoming Claire’s guardian seriously.
As the young man stumbles from one bad decision to another, cinematographer Elio Balézeaux captures the warm-colored landscapes, with Totone on his bike or his friends on a tractor, for a quasi-whimsical effect. During multiple instances, Courvoisier and Balézeaux exhibit great care in shooting intimate scenes that feel playful without explicit images. The director’s brother and mother, Charles and Linda Courvoisier, composed the inspired score that elevates the modest picture with an air of grand mysticism.
Thanks to a short-lived job driving a milk truck, clumsy Totone meets the stern Marie-Lise (Maïwène Barthélemy), a young woman who runs a farm on her own. Their initially contentious relationship evolves into a flirtatious fling, through which Totone expands his sexual horizons and evolves into a more generous lover. Their romantic connection develops physically, not only sexually but through the labor-intensive existence they are both familiar with. Courvoisier’s film, whose salt of the earth cast enchants, is enamored with unassuming, hands-on people who make a living via the might of their bodies. In turn, the relationships on screen are built on the tangible and the visible, not mere ideas.
Totone’s drunken friendship with Jean-Yves (Mathis Bernard), a tall car driver, and jokester Francis (Dimitri Baudry), may appear tenuous in its depth, seemingly reinforcing the maligned reputation of male friendships. These boys would rather sit in silence drinking beer than open up about their innermost concerns. But when Totone falls into desperation, Jean-Yves makes a selfless sacrifice, putting his most precious possession on the line to aide his pal’s unlikely dream of winning a Comté cheesemaking competition.
What these relationships may lack in intellectual introspection, they make up when it matters in concrete demonstrations of support. These characters don’t get caught in philosophizing about their troubles, but in finding solutions based on their limited resources. Totone’s buddies can’t lend him money, can’t help him find a job, but they willingly lend a hand to steal the milk he needs to make the cheese. As if she were their own little sister, both Francis and Jean-Yves also care for Claire with the utmost tenderness.
Late in “Holy Cow,” after Totone and Jean-Yves have a falling out, the former still runs to his friend’s rescue during a crucial competition. No words are exchanged, but the loyalty they have for each other is once again proven with actions. In the aspirational Hollywood studio version of “Holy Cow,” Totone and his equally adrift comrades somehow would find a loophole to win the prize. But in Courvoisier’s grounded narrative their juvenile ways clash with the real hardship of their circumstances. They can’t surmount all the obstacles in their path by sheer determination because the world is more often than not unjust by design.
Still, Courvoisier’s debut about rural life avoids a miserabilist outlook. With Claire as his biggest cheerleader, Totone pushes forward finding renewed interest in traditional cheesemaking. Focused on seemingly unremarkable characters embodying an unflashy perseverance, “Holy Cow” transmits subtle joie de vivre that rings quietly reinvigorating.
