The Kid with a Bike (2011)

Featured Audience Ratings

• Mark H

  
  Coming of age tales heavily rely on the emotional connection that audiences share with the protagonist. If we can't identify with the star, then the story may not have merit. Even the best child actors can drift into precociousness. This is not the case here, as young actor… More
  Coming of age tales heavily rely on the emotional connection that audiences share with the protagonist. If we can't identify with the star, then the story may not have merit. Even the best child actors can drift into precociousness. This is not the case here, as young actor Thomas Doret is captivating in a natural rendition. The Dardenne brothers get credit for allowing our lead character to just react. When faced with the reality of his situation, he underplays, sometimes in silence, which speaks much louder than any dialogue ever could. His acting is less of a performance than the candidly captured portrait of an actual 11 year old boy. He commands attention. Doret's talent makes up for the bare bones details that sometimes remain underdeveloped. Yet the sketchiness of the narrative feels like real life. For me the hardest thing for me to understand was his dad's capacity to disassociate from his pre-teen son. How could a father abandon his child after 11 years so easily? The justification he gives doesn't substantiate the magnitude of his decision. At first the lack of specifics is frustrating. However It provided a justification for Cyril's subsequent misbehavior. The youngster's inability to accept his father's abandonment matched mine. He was an unruly little boy but I felt as he did. Despite his unmanageable behavior, Cyril always remained a sympathetic individual at heart.

• Greg S

  
  A Belgian boy tries to reunite with the father who abandoned him; a single hairdresser takes an interest in his plight. Young Thomas Doret is excellent as the understandably troubled boy who craves love but instinctively sabotages his chances in this thoughtful heartstring-tugger.

• William D

  
  The Dardennes Brothers' "The Kid with a Bike," which tied for second prize at Cannes last year, is what you would expect from this filmmaking team: a brutally frank depiction of human callousness. Here the victim is a boy about 10 years old suddenly and inexplicably… More
  The Dardennes Brothers' "The Kid with a Bike," which tied for second prize at Cannes last year, is what you would expect from this filmmaking team: a brutally frank depiction of human callousness. Here the victim is a boy about 10 years old suddenly and inexplicably abandoned by his father, his only parent. The film opens with the boy already in an orphanage. The abandonment has just happened. The boy is frantically looking for his father, seeming to be in denial about what is going on. Quite serendipitously, he meets a generous woman in her 30s who starts to care for the boy just as inexplicably as his father stopped. She helps him in his quest to find Dad and tries to re-stabilize his life. But all is not rosy. The boy becomes intensely devoted to a drug dealer who is expert at manipulating lost boys. Watching this older boy "seduce" the younger boy by acting like a big brother is fascinating. This film has a brilliantly acute sense of how gangs attract lost children by giving them a feeling of belonging. Scratch the surface of most young boys, and what you get is a profound need to feel loved by older boys. Make a lost boy feel loved, and he'll do almost anything for you. --unfinished--

• Aaron N

  
  Cyril: Dad! I'm here. Given that the month of March was packed with an unusual amount of high budget, blockbuster films, I figured I would balance things out with a couple of independent/arthouse features as well. One of these was The Kid with a Bike, a Belgian film from the… More
  Cyril: Dad! I'm here. Given that the month of March was packed with an unusual amount of high budget, blockbuster films, I figured I would balance things out with a couple of independent/arthouse features as well. One of these was The Kid with a Bike, a Belgian film from the Dardenne brothers (Jean-Pierre and Luc). This film follows a young boy dealing with being abandoned by his father and attempting to forge new relationships with other potential role models and caretakers. The film is very naturalistic, a key type of style when it comes to the Dardenne's work, as it plays out as more character-driven, as opposed to story-driven and plays around a lot with ambiguity, despite straddling a somewhat familiar path. With that in mind, the film is very good, well-acted, and filled with moments that evoke emotion as well as thoughts based around developing more of an understanding for one's self, rather than letting the film tell you what to think. read the whole review at thecodeiszeek.com

• c0up  

  
  'The Kid with a Bike'. A superb young lead performance by Thomas Doret, difficult and frustrating at times, but a beautifully constructed, very real drama. Cyril Catoul is a kid whose absolute tenacity you can't help but admire, a character you completely sympathise… More
  'The Kid with a Bike'. A superb young lead performance by Thomas Doret, difficult and frustrating at times, but a beautifully constructed, very real drama. Cyril Catoul is a kid whose absolute tenacity you can't help but admire, a character you completely sympathise with, and then the frustration kicks in, as he goes out of his way to push away a woman showing nothing but warmth and love, while holding onto the hope of his father and all that means. You certainly go on a journey with him as his character, and he's a wonderfully complex one at that. The ending, with Cyril's quiet acceptance at the retaliation of the boy he struck, shows maturity well beyond his years. An acknowledgment of the ups and downs of life, and consequences of his actions. What the hell was up with the music signalling each of the four acts though? the film functioned fine without music the rest of the way through, and it was incredibly distracting, and added no meaning, while feeling cheap, and tacked on.

• Carlos M

  
  Although interesting at first, this drama proves to be a frustrating effort that doesn't seem to have much to say. The Dardennes continue to invest in their neo-realism but this time the characters are not well constructed and the conflicts seem artificial. Besides, the young… More
  Although interesting at first, this drama proves to be a frustrating effort that doesn't seem to have much to say. The Dardennes continue to invest in their neo-realism but this time the characters are not well constructed and the conflicts seem artificial. Besides, the young protagonist is way too dislikable.

• Eric H

  
  Following a chance encounter, hairdresser De France allows wild child Doret to leave his juvenile home and stay with her at the weekends. Upon discovering the child's father,Renier, wants nothing to do with him, she takes him into her care on a permanent basis, battling to keep… More
  Following a chance encounter, hairdresser De France allows wild child Doret to leave his juvenile home and stay with her at the weekends. Upon discovering the child's father,Renier, wants nothing to do with him, she takes him into her care on a permanent basis, battling to keep him on the straight and narrow, and away from local drug dealer Di Mateo. It sounds like the basis for a nineties TV movie, the type that usually starred Meredith Baxter Birney, and in many hands it could have amounted to such. The writing directing duo The Dardenne Brothers steer away from any schmaltz and sentimentality thankfully. Their best choice was to avoid a classic narrative structure, there's no typical beginning or ending, it's just a few weeks in the lives of the characters. The story may be cliched but the characters and the actors portraying them give it a vitality. I'm a big fan of underwriting characters, it allows the viewer to fill in the blanks and you become a lot more invested than if a screenwriter is shoving their idea of a great character down your throat. The Dardennes tell us almost nothing about the people in this story which is probably why I found them so engaging. The backstories forming in my mind are probably totally different to those of any ten other people who might watch this. Doret is incredible, a non-actor who was plucked off the street. There are very few great child actors as they almost inevitably make the the mistake of acting above their years, coming across as small adults rather than children. Doret makes no such mistake, possibly because he simply doesn't know how. He's completely natural and his awkward, uncomfortable movements are perfect for the character. I usually despise child characters in films but I was absolutely behind this one. It sounds crazy but the three best performances of the year so far have come from two twenty year old actresses and a twelve year old amateur. After a somewhat failed stint in English language productions, De France is back on home soil and should stay there as she won't get many roles as good as this in the anglicized world. With her muscular arms she looks like she could beat up any grown man but plausibly struggles to control Doret in his wilder moments. Kitchen sink dramas like this aren't usually known for being easy on the eye but Alain Marcoen's cinematography is full of eye-popping colour, proving that grittiness doesn't have to equal ugliness. The Dardennes end this in a way which will likely aggravate many viewers but I found it a perfect denouement.

• Walter M

  
  Like most boys of his age, Cyril(Thomas Doret) is full of energy, which helps in his numerous escape attempts from a chldren's home where his father(Jeremie Renier) placed him about a month previously. On one such attempt, he gets as far as his old apartment building where he… More
  Like most boys of his age, Cyril(Thomas Doret) is full of energy, which helps in his numerous escape attempts from a chldren's home where his father(Jeremie Renier) placed him about a month previously. On one such attempt, he gets as far as his old apartment building where he has to be surgically detached from Samantha(Cecile De France), a hairdresser. Not having any hard feelings, she buys him back his old bicycle which his father had sold without notifying him. In return, he asks to stay the weekends with her to which she agrees. However, even with the help of her boyfriend Gilles(Laurent Caron), they have trouble keeping him under control. Written and directed by the Dardenne brothers with their usual humanism and care, "The Kid with a Bike" is a simple title of a simple, yet subtly moving, story about a complex issue that involves responsibility at many levels. Cyril's father has surrendered his familial responsibilities in order to start over in a new town. That in return causes Cyril to grow up much quicker than normal with his father not present to guide or raise him. Samantha, accepting society's responsibility for its children, takes up a bit of the slack but can only do so much as guardian, not parent, as she owns her own business. My only problem with this otherwise engaging film might be with the epilogue, even as I possibly grasp its meaning.

• Philip P

  
  When I first watched the trailer for "The Kid with a Bike" I was engaged not by the fact that it was a foreign film that had clearly made an impression (otherwise how would it have been playing before an American film?) but instead I was intrigued by the simple story it… More
  When I first watched the trailer for "The Kid with a Bike" I was engaged not by the fact that it was a foreign film that had clearly made an impression (otherwise how would it have been playing before an American film?) but instead I was intrigued by the simple story it seemed to be telling. A universal story at that. Even the simple title of the film seems to serve as a reminder that this is not a tale specifically catered to the country that has produced it, but rather addresses emotions that every single person on the planet could relate to. As with the Academy award winning foreign film "A Separation" (which is also the last non-English film I saw) this shares that same interesting dynamic of everyday problems in a world that would otherwise seem so foreign to the average American mind. It is also notable as this is the latest feature from the Dardenne brothers. The directing team who are known for their naturalistic films that document lower class life in Belgium and are Cannes film festival regulars (this film won last years Grand Prix award) have captured a snapshot of youth that, while I have not seen any of their previous work, seems to be a constant through much of their films. From what I have heard about the directors though this film is very much a departure from their more stark style in turn for a lighter reflection of the world they have become so accustomed to documenting. The film is certainly engaging on the most basic of levels but it also contains some peculiar areas that show the difference not only in lifestyle between classes but also in the way of life between cultures. The main character, the "kid" in the title is a complex pre-teen who we don't always like (in fact alot of the time we can't stand him) who is dealing with a life event in ways that are somewhat expected but others that make us question how well we really understand not just his world, but our own. read the whole review at www.reviewsfromabed.blogspot.com

• Daniel P

  
  Review soon

• Linda K

  
  Young actor, Thomas Doret, is really the heart and soul of the film. Considering the amount of long takes in the film, he gives one of the most astonishing and strong performances that i've seen from a child actor.

• Daisy M

  
  I was always a fan of The Dardenne brothers and I have seen some of their works, such as Lorna's Silence, Rosetta, The Son and I must say that once again with The Kid with a bike, they showed their prefection in creating character studies around broken souls and dysfunctional… More
  I was always a fan of The Dardenne brothers and I have seen some of their works, such as Lorna's Silence, Rosetta, The Son and I must say that once again with The Kid with a bike, they showed their prefection in creating character studies around broken souls and dysfunctional families in the lower class of Belgium. The movie started with a young boy, Cyril who was trying to break free from an orphanage to see his father, while everyone around him was trying to explain that his father had left him there. It was a heartbreaking opening, that immediately gave the audience the taste of the magnificent storytelling the Dardennes was about to give.Cyril was a rebel rejected by his father and society and he was constantly fighting back against the authority figures in his life. Along with his emotional journey that Cyril will take you on,the Dardennes also influenced the movie with a dark tone that personally I found it added a great layer to Cyril's story.

Read all 12 featured audience ratings