Ma Vie en Rose: Movie, DVD Review (2009)

Directed by Alain Berliner. Written (in French, with English subtitles) by Chris Vander Stappen and Berliner, 88 minutes, rated R.

Renee Richards meets Romper Room in Alain Berliner’s “Ma Vie en Rose” (“My Life in Pink”), a Belgium film of great humor, unexpected style, humanity and dignity that bravely goes where few directors--and 7-year-old boys--have gone before: Into the colorful, angst-ridden world of childhood transvestitism.

Ludovic Fabre, played with astonishing poise by Georges du Fresne, is a young boy suddenly convinced he’s really a full-fledged fille. Preferring pink dresses to torn jeans, high heels to high tops, Ludovic lives his life in the protective shell of a daydream while seeking to learn the puzzling truth to his sexual identity.

Certain that something went wrong while forming in his mother’s womb, he goes to his sister, Zoe (Cristina Barget), who suggests in the painful midst of menstrual cramps that instead of being born with the female XX chromosomes, Ludo got the male XY after his “other X fell in the garbage.”

It’s an explanation that may seem ridiculous to adults, but to Ludovik, whose youth and naiveté allow him to believe in a world of limitless possibilities and endless dreams, it makes perfect sense.

Ludovik’s youth frees him to be his unique self. When his family throws a party to celebrate their move into a fashionable suburb of Paris, he attends the event in full drag as if it were the most natural thing to do. When he decides he wants to marry his father’s boss’s son, Jerome (Julien Riviere), he conducts a mock ceremony without fear of consequences or repercussions. Who else but a young boy, as yet untouched by social constructs or prejudice, could do any of these things--let alone make the self-proclaimed statement that he’s a “boygirl”--without realizing that his life will be forever damned because of it?

“Ma Vie en Rose” is as much about being born an outcast as it is about having one born to you. Ludovik’s parents, Hanna (Michele Laroque) and Pierre (Jean-Philippe Ecoffey), are good people who love their son. While they initially find Ludo’s obstinacy a peculiar distraction, they soon find themselves struggling with it as their neighbors turn against them and they are forced to leave their home when Pierre loses his job.

Understandably concerned, baffled and embarrassed, they are never demonized by director Berliner, who allows them increasing moments of frustration while never stooping to deliver Movie of the Week homilies on tolerance.

With surrealistic set designs reminiscent of Tim Burton’s “Edward Scissorhands,” “Ma Vie en Rose” offers no easy answers to Ludovik’s sexuality because Berliner knows there are no easy answers or tidy conclusions in life. There are, however, complex human stories that sometimes confound even while they entertain, which this film offers on a grand scale.

Grade: A-