My Little Loves

Jean Eustache’s second and final narrative feature, My Little Loves, follows Daniel (Martin Loeb) as he navigates the bewildering world of early adolescence. Living with his grandmother (Jacqueline Dufranne) in a sleepy village outside of Bordeaux, France, Daniel enjoys a carefree existence with his similarly innocent peers. But when his mother (Ingrid Caven) arrives and relocates him to Narbonne, Daniel is prematurely thrust into adulthood: pulled out of school, he is forced to work for a surly mechanic and left to his own devices, spurring him to fall in with an older crowd that is far more experienced in dating and sex. Featuring a wonderfully nuanced performance by Loeb, My Little Loves is a coming-of-age gem, surpassed only by Eustache’s own masterpiece, The Mother and the Whore.