Real Workouts For Real People

Spoiler: I am French-born and used to how explicit French movies can be so the amount of nudity is not shocking to me. I was brought up in the South of France and the story depicted in the film is not unknown to me in the least. I grew up watching women like Sophia make their way through the French riviera glitterati. Youth and beauty are powerful currencies that are traded for luxuries since the beginning of time so there's nothing very new there. The story unfolds at a languid and sensual pace and the score serves to create a cocooning atmosphere, thus lifting the narration from the mundanity of proletarian life to the cocoon that envelops the Rich and Wealthy. Sophia is unapologetic about who she is and what she wants and how she gets it whereas Naima is a "sweet summer child" who toes the line between childhood and adulthood. In spending the summer with her cousin Sophia, she discovers another path into womanhood she didn't know existed. She observes and absorbs and digests and never, ever judges. American sensibilities may not be open to so openly hedonistic a film but stopping at the nudity would be unfair as nudity is a character in and of itself. I found it fascinating that, as the film progresses, the general atmosphere becomes more and more deleterious. The image that came to my mind was that a beautiful, juicy apple that slowly rots away and starts festering with maggots. I honestly loved it and found it as unsettling AND soothing at the same time. Odd combo, I know.