Slalom

Based on her own experiences growing up in the ski resort of Val-d’Isère, first-time writer-director Charlène Favier crafts a very French (i.e., very ambiguous) consideration of a hot topic: coaches, athletes, and sexual abuse. Fifteen-year-old ski prodigy Lyz (rising French star Noée Abita) has been selected for an elite training program run by the demanding Fred (Jérémie Renier), whose harsh approach to training combines with her own intense competitiveness to light a fire inside her. Grappling with her burgeoning sexuality, she is drawn to Fred—but she is, after all, only 15…

‘For a debut feature, writer-director Charlène Favier’s powerful coming-of-age sports drama ‘Slalom’ couldn’t come at a more timely moment… Beautifully directed and performed, it [evokes] several scandals that have made headlines in recent years… And yet what makes ‘Slalom’ more than a mere movie of the week is how it remains, from start to finish, an engrossingly subjective account of ambivalence and abuse, with the entire narrative filtered through the anxious gaze of its star athlete…’—Jordan Mintzer, The Hollywood Reporter