
A lawyer who specializes in representing rape victims, Anne (Léa Drucker) maintains a typically bourgeois existence with her wealthy businessman husband and their two daughters. However, when her surly, 17-year-old stepson Théo (Samuel Kircher) moves in with the family, he and Anne begin a taboo romance that threatens to upset the balance of her life. Having betrayed both her family and her principles, Anne finds herself in a rare position of weakness in direct contradiction to her morals.
Last Summer is Catherine Breillat’s triumphant return to the festival circuit after a decade-long absence—and she does not disappoint. Although the film is nominally a remake of the 2019 Danish drama Queen of Hearts, the French provocateur asserts her directorial personality from frame one. Never one to shy away from discomfiting material, Breillat explores every facet of the thorny power dynamics between Anne and Théo, denying the viewer any clean lines of identification. In Last Summer, as in the rest of Breillat’s boundary-pushing oeuvre, the real transgression lies in the filmmaker’s refusal to look away.
Breillat’s sharp writing and even sharper camera make for a cinematic challenge, a cinematic gem.
Autostraddle
Léa Drucker, Samuel Kircher, Olivier Rabourdin, Clotilde Courau, Angela Chen, Serena Hu
France
2023
Special Presentations
In French with English subtitles
Incest
Book Tickets
Indigenous & Community Access
Credits
Executive Producer
René Ezra, Caroline Blanco, Clifford Werber
Producer
Saïd Ben Saïd
Screenwriter
Catherine Breillat, Pascal Bonitzer
Cinematography
Jeanne Lapoirie
Editor
François Quiqueré Lma
Production Design
Sébastien Danos
Director

Catherine Breillat
Dubbed “the bad girl intellectual of French cinema” by Amy Taubin of the Village Voice, writer-director Catherine Breillat seemingly has courted controversy since her long and prolific career began. While still in her teens she published her first novel, the erotic L’Homme facile, which was not sold to anyone in France under 18 years of age. Breillat’s film acting debut was in 1973’s groundbreaking Last Tango in Paris. Her own feature directorial debut, based on one of her novels, Une Vraie jeune fille, was originally shot in 1975 but through a combination of the bankruptcy of her producers and its shocking content that caused it to be banned, the film did not receive a release for 25 years.
Filmography: A Real Young Girl (1976); 36 Fillette (1988); Romance (1999); Fat Girl (2001); The Last Mistress (2007)
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
The Teacher
In this potent thriller, English teacher Basem witnesses the murder of a teenager by a Israeli settler. While the subsequent investigation rolls slowly towards a foregone conclusion, the teacher is caught up in a parallel kidnapping case...
Bob Trevino Likes It
When her toxic, narcissistic dad cuts her out of his life, Lily Trevino looks him up on Facebook and happens across his namesake, Bob (John Leguizamo), a gentle, genial contractor who lives nearby, and who proves an altogether better dad...
The Encampments
When pro-Palestine protests took hold of Columbia last year, the filmmakers were there from the beginning. This documentary charts the mounting tensions between students and the administration, as the protests were picked up across North America.
Shepherds
Mathyas quits his marketing job in Montreal and goes to France with the romantic notion of becoming a shepherd. He's in for a rude awakening... Based on a true story, Deraspe's stirring film plays spiritual uplift off against some 3000 sheep and a donkey.
Our Lady of the Nile
Veronica and Virginia are inseparable friends at an elite Catholic boarding school, Our Lady of the Nile, but what binds them together is the very thing that separates them forever. We are in Rwanda, 1973, and tribal tensions are simmering ominously.
Faces
Ten years after his landmark debut, Shadows, John Cassavetes returned to the indie model, self-financing this wrenching portrait of the sexual mores and miseries of American middle class. Gena Rowlands is luminous as Jeannie, the film's emotional barometer.