Un petit frère (Mother and Son)

What is it like to arrive in a new country? French filmmaker Léonor Serraille explores that experience in her gripping coming-of-age film Un petit frère. Although the original French title suggests that this drama will mainly focus on the detached experience of a little brother moving from Ivory Coast to France, Serraille's film actually falls into three chapters. These separate parts highlight first the view of mother Rose, then that of son Jean and finally that of Ernest – the 'petit frère' of the title. His memories of the many struggles and obstacles he faced together with his brother and their mother while trying to build a new life in Paris, tie Serraille's meditative film together into a heartbreaking portrait – which, thanks to the beautiful photography of Hélène Louvart (The Lost Daughter), takes your breath away.

"Un petit frère is a film about a very complicated and painful kind of coming of age, or maybe a meditation on “coming of age” as something that never actually happens; it also examines the illusory dividing line between childhood and adulthood, innocence and experience, present and past." - The Guardian