Review: Melanie Laurent's 'Breathe' Is An Insightful, Layered Teen Drama

This is a reprint of our review of "Breathe" (originally titled "Respire") from the 2014 Cannes Film Festival. The film opens in the U.S. today

There is a significant danger in premiering a female-led French-language adolescence tale with a lesbian slant on the Croisette the year after “Blue is the Warmest Color” won the Palme(s) in such memorable style. But it’s a danger that Melanie Laurent’s “Respire,” one of our greatest Cannes surprises so far, largely avoids, by establishing itself as a very different animal from the outset. Laurent's film is if no less heartfelt and sincerely delivered, less concerned with evoking the joys and miseries of first love than with outlining the potentially disastrous effects of a love gone sour, curdled into a helpless kind of obsessiveness. 

Providing an excellent showcase for the talents of her young, indecently photogenic cast––especially the two principal ingenues––it also confirms the talent of Laurent (not so long an...