at least, when he was a baby. This is a strange movie : it begins like a social drama : a single mother with a kid tries to make ends meet with an alienating job in a grim town and living in a dreadful building. For those who would like to immigrate in France, it could be revealing as my country is really rotten like this. Watching this, i thought that things never change and it was still the industrial revolution, difference being that nobody is shocked now ! In the credits, i saw that this was an Ozon's movie so i expected also and got indeed a lot of gratuitous nudity and dumb love story.Then, at the middle, the movie changes everything and becomes supernatural : the baby has wings ! nothing is explained, nothing is suggested (angel ?). This is the typical french fantasy because it's only facts. My fellows are just unable to dream, to imagine and are stick to the bare reality. With that, the movie drags and closes without having tell something.At the end, the movie is bad : the characters are dumb or inappropriate (the daughter looks like a maniac). The cast is awful, especially with this Spanish actor. There is only « Chouchou » who is left and who was my motivation to watch it.

It is easy to dismiss Francois Ozon's fantasy film "Ricky", which seems to have been overlooked by most of his fans. There are subtext subtleties which point this is no ordinary fairy tale devised by a man that has tackled families in crisis before, as it is the case with Katie, a struggling single mother with a daughter Lisa, of about ten years old, who is wiser than her years. Perhaps the director wanted to explore with this new venture how the working classes deal with their ordinary lives.Katie who works in a chemical plant, meets a new fellow worker, the Spaniard Paco, a good nature man who likes her immediately. Before long, Paco moves in Katie's council estate flat. Lisa is reluctant, at first to accept the new man in her mother's life. Nothing is revealed as to whom is Lisa's father. It does not take long for Katie to realize she is pregnant. One night, at dinner, Katie has prepared a roasted chicken. Paco, cutting the bird, asks Lisa what part of it she wants to eat. The wings, she replies. This incident bears into the story later on.The arrival of little Ricky is welcomed by all. The infant is a problem baby. He does not appear to be like others, but he appears to be healthy. Katie becomes alarmed when she notices bruises on Ricky's back, and becomes suspicious of Paco's care. Paco is enraged when confronted by her. He decides to go away, leaving his newly found family to fend for themselves. When the bruises are examined by a doctor, it is clear the boy is developing wings. What's a mother to do?Little Ricky is in fact developing small wings. They catch him over a wardrobe; little by little he is flying all over the apartment, even bumping into the glass of a window. Paco returns to find this new development. He has an idea to help with the costs they will incur if they want the baby to have an operation. How about get a friendly journalist to take their case? In fact, that only serves to get media attention when they did not want. The mere mention of this turns Katie off; how could Paco be thinking about commercialism at a time like this? After the family decides to cooperate, they come outside the housing complex holding Ricky. Paco, tying a cord around Ricky's ankles to secure he will not fly away, gives it to Katie, who in a moment of not paying attention, lets the cord loose and the infant flies away. What is a mother to do next? Missing Ricky so much, she has decided she is going to give a try on motherhood, as we watch her in bed visibly pregnant!Francois Ozon obviously wanted to tell a story that was entertaining as well as making a statement while he was at it. This film is not easy to grasp. All the elements are there and perhaps in being ambiguous, he wanted to challenge the viewer. He certainly had a way to get the attention of an audience, although it is a complex metaphor about a family and their environment and how the arrival of the new man upsets the universe between mother and a daughter that is more mature than her years.Akexandra Lamy is perfect as Katie. She is a capable actress with a natural intelligence in her approach as the mother. Little Melusine Mayance surprises with the way she plays Lisa. This girl is not obnoxious in contrast with other screen young actresses; she appears to be a natural. Sergi Lopez is the affable Paco, the immigrant who is rewarded with an instant family in his adopted country. Mr. Lopez keeps giving strong performances. Arthur Peyret is adorable as Ricky.

Having watched all his other movies, it was only time before I stumbled into this film. I have 3 kids and reluctantly lately watch movies with kids. The movie starts in a typical French Ozon way. No stress, no fuss, no problems. We are captured. We get into it. Slowly we are dragged into his realm. And then... everything goes wrong. There is no way a mother wouldn't run to the hospital if she discovered her son to have bruises on his back. NO WAY. It's not realistic or convincing to say that "I don't want doctor involved"! Please! And then she blames the lover for the bruises and sends him away. But when the wings appear!!! She does not call him to apologise.... WEAK And when they finally face the media, showing off the flying chicken, sorry, Kid, the rope is so thin, it is unreasonable to imagine this happening in real life (because this is the problem with the movie, it's trying to convince us this is actually happening in real life!!!) with such lack of security, and of course he flies off into nowhere! Terrible. The characters are not developed. With the exception of the daughter of the main character, no one is into the performance (ok, maybe the chicken child is having fun). I went to bed thinking it could be a 5 for trying to introduce something new and for the beginning of the movie. But really, it's a ONE for trying to convince us with absolute rubbish. The first scene is possibly the only intriguing part of the whole movie that slowly disintegrates with no solution, answer, meaning, appeal.... oh, what a mess!

I realize that some Ozon fans are disappointed by the outcome of this project, as can be seen by another review here on IMDb also. I do understand that some might feel that Ozon should have better stick to what he was doing. But I think he did a very good job here. Behind all the "normality" of the movie, there lies an ambiguity. The movie deals with loss or better how people react to loss.Loss of material things, emotional loss and of course other losses too. That's what I felt watching it, but I can also tell, that some people might have gotten a completely different vibe from the movie. And that is what makes it special. It might not be his best movie (I haven't watched all his movies), but it is pretty good. Especially since it disguises itself as normal movie ... well as normal as an Ozon movie can be of course.