Enzo - IFFDAY

Official selection

This is the final work of director Laurent Cantet, who passed away in 2024. It was completed by his longtime collaborator, director Robin Campillo, in a beautiful joint creation that fuses their cinematic sensibilities with remarkable subtlety. Enzo, a teenage boy from a middle-class family living in a villa with a swimming pool, dreams of becoming a bricklayer. On a construction site, he is drawn to Vlad, a Ukrainian migrant worker torn between returning to his war-torn homeland or remaining in France. To Enzo, who finds his own parents dull and uninspiring as white-collar workers, Vlad emerges as both a role model and a man who awakens him to greater values. The film strikingly captures the immaturity of a boy who ‘confesses’ that he wants to go and fight in Ukraine with Vlad, alongside his aimless rebelliousness and the fleeting moments of adolescence; the impressive moments of teenagers who are so easily blinded, yet just as quick to open their eyes again. Some may even be reminded of Call Me by Your Name (2017) in the final scenes. It was selected as the Opening Film of the Directors’ Fortnight at the 78th Cannes Film Festival.

Programme note by LEE Juhyun