Scrawny Marie (Pauline Acquart) and awkward chubby friend Anne (Louise Blachère) are standard outsiders. It's summer and they hang out at the pool watching the synchronized swimmers. Marie befriends beautiful Floriane (Adèle Haenel) who leads the swim team. Floriane is the subject of much gossip. Marie starts hanging out with Floriane putting pressure on her friendship with Anne. Meanwhile Anne is obsessed with hunky François.It's a story of sexual searching and an awkward coming-of-age. There are a few daring scenes. I love when Marie and Anne have a fight. However the plot feels a bit too slight. It's too quiet and the danger is all internal. I want more conflicts. In the end, some stuff happens but they all end up in the same place.

Teen dramas usually deal with the cruelty of boys; Water Lilies shows that girls can be equally vicious with each other. Fifteen year olds, Anne, the fat and lonely kid is always present, going back to the victim in Lord of the Flies, whose glasses are broken by the sadists he is trapped on an island with. Marie is the one searching for love, and seems to find it with Floriane, the blossoming beauty who looks like trouble from the start.The three first meet at a swimming pool and become involved with a synchronized swim team; thus the title, Water Lilies. The typical adolescent angst follows, with laughter and tears and fights. It is also the story of sexual awakening and discovery, in the typical laid back European fashion. The film could not have been made here in America, with its' uptight views on human sexuality. Nothing groundbreaking occurs, the three girls go through the routine troubles of high school students everywhere. The actresses are good and the script passable, for a rating of 6/10.

It sounds as if it should be a biography of Claude Monet but it's actually a highly focused story of relationships between three adolescent girls on a French synchronized swimming team. There are no parents or teachers to speak of, no school, and boys are represented by one peripheral figure, the hunky Francois who enters the story determined from time to time and always leaves confused.Pauline Aquart is the youngest of the three, only aspiring to join the team she so much admires. She's kind of odd looking. She's not yet out of her adolescent growth spurt and has long, bony limbs, big feet, and no derriere to speak of. She's prognathous and sports these plump pursed lips. After a while her appearance grows on you and from certain angles she can come to appear enthralling.Adele Haenel is older -- more, well, more developed physically. What a glamorous figure she cuts in her swim suit, sauntering around, teasing the boys, swishing her long blond hair. But she's not what she seems. Or is she? I couldn't quite figure it out. The French are long on paradoxes and short on consistency. No wonder Francois is always sniffing after her.There's not so much ambiguity in Louse Blachere's character. She's on the team too but she's dumpy and plain, and sensitive about it, and has an intense crush on Francois. Blachere is a good actress and adds to the ungainliness of the character through her performance.The movie deals with the relationships between these three, meaning intrigues, deceptions, hidden feelings, and all the rest of what we associate with young girls who spend much time with one another. This is of course a tricky topic. It becomes trickier during the gradual development of a homoerotic relationship between Pauline and Adele. Not that you should expect this to be a soft porn movie. The only nudity we see is considerably less than a turn on, and what little sex there is under the covers, sometimes literally.I don't think I want to get into the plot or into its analysis too much, partly because it's suggestive rather than expressed through action, partly because it's complex, and partly because I'm not sure I got it all.Let me give an example. Okay. Adele is the girl the others envy. She's also quite distant and self satisfied. On top of that she is apparently schtupping every boy and man in sight if they can be of any use to her at all, from the handsome but dumb Francois to the bus driver she wants a favor from. She brags unashamedly about her expertise in fellatio. When Pauline approaches her about joining the swim team, Adele uses her as a lookout during assignations with the guys. A superior and self-indulgent narcissist, you know? But then the soi-disant slut takes the skinny Pauline under her wing and reveals to Pauline that she's still a virgin. Really? Yes, really. Pauline begins to draw closer to Adele and Adele finally confesses that she'd like to rid herself of her hymen and she would like Pauline to do it for her. Pauline, now drawn sexually to Adele, performs the task with subdued relish. NOW Adele would REALLY like to get it on with a man, preferably older and experienced. So she takes Pauline to a boite where she dances seductively with some guy until she follows Pauline to the powder room. The two girls stand there staring at one another, neither having overtly expressed a sexually tinged interest in the other. But Adele stands so close that Pauline slowly loosens her own reins, reaches up, and kisses Adele on the lips. Adele steps back, smiling, and says, "There now, that wasn't so bad, was it?", and then walks back into the club.That's a pretty close description of whatever is going on between Pauline and Adele -- but what the hell IS going on? Initially, Adele treats Pauline like an irrelevant child, later like a close friend, finally like a potential lover -- and the minute Pauline responds, Adele walks off satisfied. Is she USING Pauline the way she seems to be using men? Does it satisfy Adele to know that she now has another person in involuntary servitude? I don't know.I've slighted Louise Blachere as the third member of the trio, the plain and overripe wallflower whose expression always suggests dumbfoundedness but who at least is thoroughly heterosexual and the first of the three to rid herself of that noisome virginity, but I've only skipped her for considerations of space.Should you see it? By all means. (Just compare it to the typical American movie about high school kids.) For men, some of whom have never penetrated the female mystique, this may give you some idea of what it looks like in medium shot.

I cheer for films that fill in subject matter gaps in world cinema. So after watching the trailer for "Water Lilies," I expected to like this film because I thought I'd stumbled on something unique: a movie that honestly portrays teen lesbian love - sort of a female version of "Beautiful Thing." The main characters are young French women 15 years old. Marie is slender, reticent and pretty in a tomboyish way; Floriane is outgoing, athletic and beautiful; and Anne is loyal, pudgy and behaviorally immature. The erotic interrelationship between Marie and Floriane is always simmering in this movie, if not at the surface, then just below it. "Water Lilies," however, is not about the dawning of lesbian love upon two teens; it is about sexual frustration, suffering, ennui, teens working at cross-purposes and - in at least two instances - joyless, mechanical sex. It also proves that screenwriters and film-makers mar their own creations when they become too manipulative.In the extra features on the "Lord of the Flies" DVD, director Peter Brook says, "French cynicism starts with the arousal of sex," meaning the French regard children as angels while they regard adolescents and adults with a pervasive cynicism. Part of the downfall of this film is film-maker Celine Sciamma has gulped a mighty dose of this cynicism."Where is the joy?" I asked myself while watching this film. Yes, first love can be painful and frustrating, but it can also be joyful and triumphantly erotic in a fresh, life-affirming way. These positive aspects are missing from this movie; there is no balance.Organically, this movie wants to be a poignant celebration of first love. But Sciamma is too impressed with her own cynicism and cleverness and ruins the film. First, what is the point of showing only the plump girl nude? I know there is an established tradition of tasteful teen nudity in European cinema, as evidenced by films like "The Slingshot; The Rascals; The Devil, Probably; The Little Thief; Murmur of the Heart; Friends; Beau Pere" and "Europa, Europa"; but this instance is a petty authorial intrusion - "See, audience, I can make a film where I show only the unattractive person nude." Either no nudity or evenly distributed nudity would've been an honest way to go.There is a scene in a club where Floriane and Marie are dancing. What follows next is not just Floriane cynically manipulating Marie; it is film-maker Sciamma cynically manipulating her audience.Perhaps the biggest betrayal of authenticity and organic honesty takes place when Floriane warns Marie she's about to request something that is "not normal." Marie understandably asks, "Who cares about being normal?" Then Sciamma plays false with her audience and the hurtling momentum of the movie, because Floriane's request is a phony, derivative and substitute question - not the authentic, heartfelt question the movie, Marie's character and the viewers who've invested their time deserve. Here are also two moments which clank falsely on the viewer's nerves: 1) Since when do the French - of all people - take baths wearing bathing suits, and with a turtle to boot? 2) What teen - of any nationality - would chomp down on an apple core that's been thrown in the garbage in order to get a taste of the beloved's mouth?The three main actresses are promising and, if they find better vehicles for their talents, may become excellent actors. Louise Blachere (Anne) is the best actress in terms of technique and could have a successful career in supporting roles. Adele Haenel (Floriane) could become a leading lady, or a bombshell, or both. Pauline Acquart (Marie) possesses an intensity and magnetism which are unmistakable. In the future, she could play everything from an emotionally crippled librarian to a mysteriously sensual seductress to a reluctant politician riding a meteoric rise in acclaim.All in all, "Water Lilies" was very disappointing. Will an honest film-maker please make an authentic movie about two young women falling in love! No - not necessarily for the sake of this middle-aged guy - but so young lesbian girls can have something of quality they can watch and identify with. And yes, to fill a subject matter gap in world cinema.