In her fictional feature debut, director Delphine Deloget tackles family, parenthood, and the foster care system with emotional depth.
Sylvie (Virginie Efira) is a single mother raising two boys. They’re a tight-knit family who love and support each other through the good times and the bad, and they have a routine. Sylvie works nights, and her eldest son, Jean-Jacques (Félix Lefebvre), a teenager in his final year of high school, keeps an eye on his little brother, Sofiane (Alexis Tonetti), overnight.
One night, there is a gap of time in which Sofiane is left alone in the house, and he accidentally starts a kitchen fire that leaves him with burns on his chest. Jean-Jacques rushes him to the hospital and alerts their mother, who meets them there. The good news is Sofiane will be alright; the family returns home, Sylvie helps Sofiane through his recovery, and Sofiane heads back to school. The bad news is child protection services is alerted, and they arrive at the house to take Sofiane into custody.
The family is obviously traumatized by being forcibly separated, and it is heartbreaking to watch as they all suffer. Sylvie immediately launches into a battle, aided by a lawyer, to get her young son back. However, the system seems complicated by design as well as full of bias and prejudice against single parents and working class families. As a single mother, Sylvie is judged more harshly and faces extra barriers in the system’s requirement that she prove her ability to care for her children.
For example, Sylvie must listen to comments and questions about her life as a single parent that infer a two-parent household would make Sylvie a more eligible mother. Sylvie endures cruel offhanded remarks from the lead protection officer, who tells Sylvie how happy she is that she’s been able to find another family for Sofiane to live with, as it’s hard to find a family who would want “a child like him.” The protection agency also arranges visitation times when Sylvie must work, jeopardizing the very job security they require from her. They also demonstrate a lack of empathy and understanding that separating an unwilling child from his mother might cause behavioural issues such as lashing out in pain and anger.
Although child protection services is largely painted as the villain of the story, All to Play For does touch on its importance for those in need, such as a friend of Sylvie who comments he was better off in a foster home than being beaten by his abusive father; however, for the most part the film presents the child protection system as quick to judge and impossible to overcome.
That said, Sylvie is not portrayed as a perfect hero; the film is careful to present her as flawed and complicated—essentially, a human being. She makes mistakes. She sometimes lets her emotions get the best of her. Efira embodies it all in a wonderful performance as Sylvie, evoking the full spectrum of emotion as she takes us through the highs and lows of Sylvie’s life as a parent and her continued push to reunite her family.
The situation takes a massive toll on the whole family as Sylvie, Jean-Jacques, and Sofiane each visibly suffer and become increasingly frayed at the edges, whih in turn negatively impacts their case to get Sofiane back, thus ensuring a vicious loop. It demonstrates the need to provide more support for families rather than simply creating more obstacles and, in turn, consequences.
Deloget, who also wrote the screenplay, captures a realism in Rien à Perdre that reflects her experience as a documentary filmmaker. The family in this story may be fictional, but the relationships and dynamics feel authentic. This is in part due to solid performances and chemistry all around, including the young actors.
Rien à Perdre had its world premiere at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, where it was selected as part of the Un Certain Regard programme.
© 2020-2023. UniversalCinema Mag.