It is more important now than ever to engage with and create art that challenges us. Art from and influenced by other areas and cultures, confronting subjects that make us uncomfortable and force us to consider ways of thinking that we’d never imagined previously. Writer/director Kaveh Daneshmand’s feature debut, ENDLESS SUMMER SYNDROME, is one such challenging piece of work. It is confrontational, though perhaps not in the way you might imagine.
One peaceful summer day, Delphine (Sophie Colon), receives a call that shakes the foundations of her happy, blended family. An anonymous coworker of her husband Antoine’s (Matteo Capelli) reveals that he drunkenly confessed to an affair with one of Delphine and Antoine’s adopted children. Delphine does not tell anyone of the call, but immediately begins suspecting her husband and searching for evidence of what she feels is the truth. Her greatest struggle is pretending as though the world has not crashed down around her, and indeed her serene facade is immediately fractured. She becomes aggressive — which is to be expected — but it is also very clear which of her children Delphine expects is the victim.
The turns ENDLESS SUMMER SYNDROME takes are somewhat apparent even from the beginning, however the presentation is woven in such a way that the point is less about the shock of the reveal, and more about interrogating personal preconceived ideas. From the jump — and somewhat insistently as the film progresses—there is a great deal of emphasis put on establishing the family as having open, progressive attitudes with one another. They drink together, smoke together, and have little discomfort with nudity among one another. We’re meant to view this family unit as a kind of safe haven with very few barriers between them, accepting of everything. Yet with one hit to this shiny exterior, the most reductive, common lines of thinking are revealed, a beast blinding Delphine from a truth she has no frame of reference with which to face.
I do not believe this is any sort of failure on the part of the film. Rather, I think it is largely the point. Delphine is convinced that her husband is having an affair with their daughter Adia (Frédérika Milano), and responds in much the same way many do to women victims — making Adia cover her body while out by the pool, searching her room for evidence, and grilling her about her sexual history. Even while holding the belief that the perpetrator is the monster, there is nevertheless a marked inclination to treat victims with such hostility.
When the truth comes out, it is more of a shock to Delphine than it is to the viewer. We spend so much time aligned with her that it becomes more a study of her response to the situation than a particularly scandalous reveal.
ENDLESS SUMMER SYNDROME is a fascinating effort in no small part because it challenges us to consider and confront our own responses to the situation at hand in ways that feel designed to make us uncomfortable beyond just what is playing out onscreen. Yes, the incestuous affair is in itself scandalous and provocative. But how does what it provokes in us align with how the story shakes out? How often do we respond as Delphine does? Does this change the more we learn about her?
ENDLESS SUMMER SYNDROME is rife with victims and villains, and all the messy, complex humanity in between. Direct impact and collateral damage are everywhere. And no house in the world, it seems, is beyond the societally conditioned, first instinct response of interrogating, punishing, and changing women and girls.
ENDLESS SUMMER SYNDROME is on VOD now.
Tags: Altered Innocence, Endless Summer Syndrome, Frederika Milano, Gem Deger, Kaveh Daneshmand, Matteo Capelli, Sophie Colon
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