Enzo, a teenager from a wealthy family, dodges his class expectations by dropping out of school and apprenticing as a builder. Feeling out of place in the family’s elegant villa and disconnected from his peers, Enzo finds himself attracted to fellow builder Vlad, who is from Ukraine. Driven by newcomer Eloy Pohu’s youthful energy, Enzo is a perfect blend of social concern and seductive sensuality.
The Garden Cinema View:
That Enzo feels like two films in one - a meditation on war and a coming-of-age queer awakening - is explained by a tragic circumstance: Laurent Cantet died before completing it, leaving his longtime collaborator Robin Campillo to finish the film. Cantet's political preoccupations and Campillo’s sensuality sit somewhat uneasily together, and what emerges is neither one thing nor the other - though there is enough of both to hold the attention.
Fans of Call Me by Your Name will find familiar terrain in the sun-drenched pangs of a first queer awakening, even if Enzo never quite commits to that story with the same depth and intensity. Equally, those expecting the sharp social observation of Cantet's films such as The Class or Time Out may feel that Enzo's fascination with manual labour and working-class life occasionally drifts into class tourism.
Yet with a riotous, hormonal teenager at its centre - played with conviction by Eloy Pohu - whose decisions frustrate and exhilarate in equal measure, this is above all an effective portrait of this turbulent phase of life.
