Anaïs (Anaïs Reboux in her only acting role as of 2013) is the titular character in Catherine Breillat's Fat Girl ("À ma soeur!" being its original French title). A chubby twelve year old girl, who finds herself constantly browbeaten by her fifteen year old sister, Elena (Roxane Mesquida) while they are vacationing with their parents off the coast of France. Elena, unlike her sister, is thin, incredibly gorgeous, and possesses a beautiful body. A topic of discussion between the two young girls as they listlessly walk around the resort is their virginity and their relationships. Elena, while sexually promiscuous, holds the belief that your virginity should be taken by someone you love. Her younger sister, however, believes that you should your first time should happen just to happen and you should just get it over with.While walking, they meet a law student named Fernando (Libero De Rienzo), who immediately finds himself attracted to Elena. Not long after meeting him does Elena invite Fernando up to her room to talk. Fernando believes like Elena does - that sex should be something sacred and special - but he winds up convincing her to partake in anal sex instead, as vaginal sex is something that judges whether or not you still have your virginity.While it is questionable that Fernando actually believes what he is saying, we can see Elena's hesitation during the foreplay and the sex. We are well aware of her beliefs at this point in time, however, we can see that she has a common curiosity about sex so much so that she simply wants to see just how the act is performed and executed.This scene is one lengthy, naturalistic shot Breillat conducts in the room shared by Elena and Anaïs, boldly establishing real-time, mood, and discomfort just by the way the shot is framed, how long it lasts, and how the characters are placed inside the shot. Fernando and Elena are spooning, with Elena's nightgown on and her vagina and pubic hair clearly visible to the audience. Fernando continues to rub her stomach in a way that doesn't change Elena's blank, frustrated, and confused expression. She knows what she's doing is wrong but is overcome by understandable adolescent curiosity. Anaïs is laying in bed several feet away, closing her eyes and pretending her sister's innocence isn't being taken away in front of her.Fat Girl works well because it illustrates the sexual tendencies of the female and a believable sibling rivalry that is captured with surprising purity and tenderness. When Anaïs and Elena fight, it's nothing but believable. When the two talk quietly in bed it is also believable, almost as if they are real-life sisters. This is because Reboux and Mesquida are not only great screen presences but evoke relatable chemistry as young girls. This chemistry is what the entire film rests on, due to the fact that parents' roles are predicated off of disinterest and ignorance, leaving the girls to utilize each other for companionship and advice.It's a tough subject and Breillat doesn't sugarcoat it. Either she lived a grim reality similar to her characters or she has seen friends go through circumstances akin to Anaïs's and Elena's. Or perhaps she has her head inside a teenage girls' head. Perhaps she just has a deep resonance and an awareness to the sexual maturity of adolescent girls. If that's the case, it would be tough to communicate such a resonance, but Breillat finds ways to do so in Fat Girl that make the film an unsettling and often very consuming piece of work.Much has been made about the ending that is admittedly out of nowhere, able to shock the most hardened viewer raw because of its jolting nature, and implied to add ambiguity and an additional layer to the story. After several hours, where it has crossed my mind about every five minutes, I have not made up my mind on it. An amendment to the review will be made if I do. Perhaps it's a rare moment when an instance in a very great film happens that I'll never be able to define. Did I like it? Did I loathe it? Is it out of place? Does it derail the story? No matter the answer to the question, the previous seventy-nine minutes were still disturbing and well worth seeing.Starring: Anaïs Reboux, Roxane Mesquida, Libero De Rienzo, and Arsinée Khanjian. Directed by: Catherine Breillat.

Fat Girl (2001) **** (out of 4) 12-year-old Anais (Anais Reboux) and her 15-year-old sister Elena (Roxane Mesquida) are on summer vacation when the two discover sex and start to explore their virginity. Things take a change for reality when the older sister meets a boy who claims to love her. This is an incredible little film and there's no wonderful it caused so much controversy here in the States. I think it's a damn shame that American films no longer contain any guts and when a film with a true message comes along it usually stirs up trouble. This is an incredibly moving, heartbreaking and shocking look at two young girls and how they view their virginity. The ending was outrageously shocking but the message was right there. It's been a very long time since I've seen a film that left such an impact. I'm sure most will be turned off by the subject matter and the films blunt truthfulness towards that subject but this is a real gem.

(CONTAINS SPOILERS-The ending is discussed) Another stunningly strange film from Catherine Breillat, director of Romance, Anatomy of Hell and Real Young Girl.The plot concerns two sisters the older one, Elena who is about 14 or 15, and is thin and beautiful, and the younger,Anais, who is 12, is fat. While on vacation they meet a law student and Elena begins a dangerous flirtation with the young man. This quickly leads to several secret night time visits to the girls room as Anais watches her sister and her paramour. Tension grows between the girls as Anais longs for the affection that her sister is getting.I should state I'm not a fan of Catherine Breillat. I find her films shocking and silly. Clearly she's going for an effect, which she usually achieves, and which is usually dissipated by the the lack of anything behind it (to paraphrase some one famous she presents the obvious by way of the scandalous). Here for example we have several scenes of intimacy between Elena and her beau, which are filmed in long almost painful takes that simulate Anais watching from across the room. The scenes are edgy for what they are showing and uncomfortable since the girl involved is 14 or 15. (Anais is suppose to be 12. Though both seem older.) For me the scenes went from intriguing to uncomfortable to dull rather quickly as they seemed to just drag on. To me the scenes would have worked better had we gotten to know the two girls more at the start. Certainly a later scene where the pair shows affection for each other adds a great deal the relationship between the pair, but for me it was too late to affect the early sex scenes. Breillat also goes for effect when she has the mother drive the girls home and we have what seems like a two hour ride with the three women in the car moving in and out of traffic. Its grand foreshadowing and she builds tension for an event that never comes while at the same time keeping you sleepy enough that when the final bit comes you're completely unprepared.I have to tell you what that was but nothing that happens in the preceding 80 minutes prepared me for the unintentionally funny conclusion of this film. Many people find the sudden and shocking turn of events horrify and unnerving and the very end is, however what sparks that is simply very silly, and it was so out of left field, so bizarre, so ridiculous that the boredom of the long car sequence was sent packing as I doubled over in a fit of laughter. I can not and could not believe that anyone would do what Breillat does. Its a shock technique that doesn't belong in this film or a film like this which no doubt why so many people are horrified by it. Even if this were the sort of film that it might belong in, no one would do it as silly as here. What bothers me is that it leads up to a disturbing event that, and we should be really shocked and rattled to our core but for me it was wildly undercut in its power because what it took to get us there was so contrived and so ludicrous it runs the final bit.I don't know what deeper meaning was behind it all, certainly the rivalry between sisters and sexual longing and such,but I got no hidden truth, nothing I didn't know before. I'm sure it has something with Anais' statements about sex, then again it could be the most forceful statement of what many consider a slasher films morality, namely sex is bad. To be honest I had my cage rattled a bit, but to what end? Perhaps had I been a girl with a sister or two this might have meant something to me, but as it stands now its a dullish movie with a WTF ending.I'd leave this review there except I have to say something about the best thing in this film, namely the two girls the story revolves around. They are both stunning beautiful and damn fine actresses. The interplay between them is very real and I would love to see them paired up again, in a better film. To be honest they are so good that I will probably watch this again to see them interact (especially in the secrets scene) 4 out of 10 (I was tempted to say 5 out of ten but the ending really strikes me as too silly- a great moment-but for all the wrong reasons. I think the end is what sealed this films doom)

Catherine Breillat's "Fat Girl" (2001) is an astounding movie that provides uncompromising and unblinking look at the relationship between two teenage sisters, and their first sexual experiences. The older sister, 15 years old Elena, has no problems attracting boys' attention and sexual desire and while on the family vacation, she meets an older, more experienced boy, who will say and promise anything to seduce her. There are two long, thorough and uncomfortable scenes of seducing Elena that take place in the girls' bedroom with the younger sister, 12 years old Anais, the fat girl of the title not quite asleep. Breillat remembers well what the hell it is to be a teenager, to be confused, frustrated, to think low of yourself, to be ready to enter the world of sexual relationships, to be ready for love, for intimate closeness and to pretend that you don't care about them at all. She also looks closely and with none a gram of sentimentality into siblings' and parents –daughters relationship. The scenes of cruelty and contempt the older sister treats the younger one alternate with rare but poignant moments of tenderness and understanding. Breillat takes us to places we don't go often and we don't want to go but they exist. If you've seen Brellat's movies already, you know that her outlook is not particularly happy, optimistic, or sentimental but "Fat Girl" will shock you as very few movies can. Just when you think that the movie is over and despite the disappointments, embarrassing revelations, and shameless manipulations, live goes on and has so much to offer, Breillat presents you with the final scene that is very difficult to watch and impossible to forget. It does not matter really if the final scene actually took place or was just a fantasy, just the dream projected on the screen.