The Kid with a Bike

Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne won their fourth major Cannes prize with The Kid with a Bike (2011), sharing the Grand Prix. A characteristically spare drama of a child in crisis, it ranks among the most accessible and emotionally direct films from the Belgian brothers, even featuring rare flickers of musical score where their work is usually silent.

Newcomer Thomas Doret plays Cyril, the boy whose furious search for his absent father drives every scene, with Cécile de France as Samantha, the hairdresser who takes him in for reasons the film never over-explains. The Dardennes shoot in their familiar present-tense, handheld style, staying close to the restless child as he careens between hope and self-destruction. Samantha's unconditional patience, set against the boy's volatility and the pull of a local delinquent, gives the film the shape of a modern fairy tale.

Critics praised its compassion and its restraint, and de France's performance was widely admired. Tender, tense and finally redemptive, The Kid with a Bike distils the Dardennes' humanism into the story of a single damaged boy and the woman who refuses to give up on him. It is among the most moving entries in one of contemporary cinema's most consistent bodies of work. De France's quietly radiant performance and the rare flickers of musical score give the film an almost fairy-tale grace, and it remains among the most emotionally direct entries in the Dardennes' formidable body of work.