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MovieMail's Review
My Summer of Love's gorgeous, matter-of-fact cinematography and dreamy soundtrack celebrates a beautiful, rural British summer and a love affair between two teenage girls.
The scene in which Tamsin and Mona first meet neatly sketches their characters and their disparate backgrounds. On a sunny afternoon in a tranquil Yorkshire valley Mona is lying by a roadside verge dozing, her motorbike beside her. It's engineless - bought from some “gyppoes” at the maggot farm for a tenner. Then, from her literally down-to-earth point of view we see Tamsin ride confidently up on her well-groomed horse.
Tamsin plays the cello, drinks red wine, listens to Parisian crooners and rides horses. She has a favourite bathroom in her parent's voluminous stately home; Mona has a favourite rock in a nearby river. Tamsin is also amusingly pretentious, advising the plain-spoken yet witty Mona that she simply must read Nietzsche (...or Freud).
They become friends. Symbolically, Tamsin buys Mona an engine for her crippled motorbike and accompanied by the seductive sounds of Goldfrapp, they storm around during sun-drenched afternoons, lie in fields, splash in rivers and share a first kiss. Their individual isolation nudges this odd couple together - they shut themselves up in Tamsin's family home sunbathing, drinking and whiling the summer away.
However the sun sets on the season, bringing practical realities and the end of their relationship with it. As Mona strides off following their first and final argument, through a shaky and atmospheric handy-cam we see new-found poise and confidence - a gratifying consequence of her affair.
Pawlikowski's second film was a critic's darling when it was released theatrically last year. It's not difficult to see why - it's an impeccably made, charming, romantic British film without a whiff of romcom or a gangster in sight.
A beautiful and unorthodox love story charting the intense relationship through the course of one summer between the posh Tamsin and the smart and fearless Mona. A candidate for the best British film of 2004.
