When they hear sinister bangs on the wall followed by roars, a mother and her two kids decide to run to the forest. «Let’s play a game. We pretend we´re escaping the house». 8-year-old Simon decides to take his pyrite, while his mom chooses a family picture. The three of them leave the house walking into a street where debris and dead bodies are mixed with as trange grey fog. What has happened? What are those howls they hear in the distance? Only in the forest will they be safe… or perhaps they won’t.

Les enfants (Jean-Sébastien Chauvin, 2014)

Both of the children’s wild imagination will manage to soothe their mother’s terror when, in the distance, they can see a mysterious white light that Simon and his younger sister seem to recognize.

This fantasy tale, filled with devastated landscapes and disturbing mists, is French director´s Jean-Sébastien Chauvin fifth film. Besides directing, Chauvin is also a film critic in several publications, such as Cahiers du Cinéma, and teaches at ESEC. His short-film Et ils gravirent la montagne was preselected in the last edition of the Cesar Prizes. The Kids (Les enfants) is the first collaboration between Chauvin and writer Hélène Frappat that also collaborates in Cahiers magazine and has published several novels and essays.

The Kids is part of the Official Selection of the 7th edition of the International Medium-Length Film Festival La Cabina that takes place in the Filmoteca de Valencia.

THE KIDS (LES ENFANTS) | Jean-Sébastien Chauvin · Fantasy · France · 2014 · 32 min