Becoming herself

I speak to Lucas Dhont on the phone from London. He’s happy and busy, promoting his film Girl, because although he’s not yet 30, he’s already directed his first feature film to critical acclaim, as well as some controversy.

Girl has won, among other awards, the Caméra d’Or for best feature film, as well as the Queer Palm. I ask him if he’s proud of his film. “Yes!” he says excitedly, and when he talks about his work it’s not the awards he talks about but the work itself and the story he has created around the life of a small family going through immense changes in a teenager’s life.

On the surface, Girl is a story about Lara who’s transitioning at the tender age of 15 from a boy to a girl, while at the same time training to become a professional ballerina. But as the story develops, it’s clear that the film’s themes are much more universal than this; it’s a film about growing up, about determination, about a father’s love and a young brother’s loyalty. There’s so much emotion in it that, while Lara’s struggles are quite specific to her own body, it’s impossible not to sympathise with the adolescent struggles she faces.

Dhont himself tells me that it’s during adolescence that...