It’s hard to shock the French, but when À nos amours was released in 1983, audiences weren’t sure how to respond to Sandrine Bonnaire. A fifteen year old girl drawn to sex like a kitten to a bowl of cream: the young ingenue seduced an entire country as the promiscuous and tres dangereux Suzanne.

With a dimple that could get her out of jail and perfectly rounded breasts, that she confidently bares throughout the film, it is hard not to get turned on watching this precocious young thing tease and play. And that’s where the discomfort lies: Should we really be watching this jeunne fille get naked?

But it isn’t actually fucking that we are watching but the deep breathing after climax, untamed locks soaked with sweat that caress soft cheek bones, a young woman feeling her body for the first time. The French really know how to do sexy and in À nos amours you can smell it and practically feel the dewy spring air breathe up from under your skirt.

Beyond tormenting young love, À nos amours churns us through complicated family dynamics where parental roles are confused, sibling relationships are violent and the uncontrollable Suzanne is lost trying to find her path with little guidance and a charging hormonal rage that knows no bounds.

From the way a soft pink shirt hangs on her slight shoulders to how she pulls a cigarette to her mouth, Bonnaire is sinful voyeuristic pleasure in this breakout role that launched her career as the lustful and complex cinematic starlet of France whose following remains loyal today.

À nos amours plays at TIFF Bell Lightbox Friday March 10 at 9PM and is part of a special TIFF Cinematheque programming series that will highlight the daring and provocative career of actress Sandrine Bonnaire.

For full schedule of the TIFF retrospective go here. 

~ Jen McNeely