Sauvage / Wild

Mandragora: Freelancer Edition (it’s not even short a rich music-loving sadist or drugging a client to clean out his apartment). I appreciate raw naturalism until the moment it turns into exploitation, and the vehemence to show the utter bottom by giving the tubercular protagonist nothing to do but drink from a puddle and sleep with his head on the curb in the middle of the street is getting dangerously close. If I can appreciate the film for not taking note of the salon straight liberals of Pride with its scenes, and admit that one scene emotionally wrecked me with its sudden tenderness (the doctor), then I can't overlook when the film, despite its point of inexorability, tries to have some development and is thus forced to drive the protagonist to the brink of mild mental retardation. (10/16/2019)

Savage offers an authentic and raw look into the lives of prostitutes without embellishments and with plenty of explicit scenes, so it is definitely not a film for a mass audience. The character of Léo if there’s none so blind as those who will not see. Even though the film is only over an hour and a half long, it felt longer. Personally, I would have appreciated if they had, if only superficially, hinted at the background of the characters (How did they get into prostitution?), because the daily routine of the prostitutes' lives became boring towards the end. Despite a few emotionally powerful moments, Savage didn't get under my skin and in fact I had trouble sympathizing with the main character in any way. Bold and raw scenes don't always guarantee success. (03/22/2020)