Tu Dors Nicole
Dog Days of Summer • 1h 33m
Stéphane Lafleur • France • 2014 • Luminous black-and-white, sultry melancholy coming-of-age tale.
Nicole is adrift after college graduation, working a dead-end summer job at a second-hand clothing shop in her small Quebec hometown. She spends her evenings with her best friend, Véronique, and ambles the suburban streets when it’s too hot to sleep. One day Nicole’s brother Rémi shows up with his two band-mates, an unwelcome signal that things can and will change.
Shot in lustrous black-and-white and immersed in the languorous rhythms of summer, Tu Dors Nicole wistfully captures the liminal moment between female adolescence and young adulthood. Stéphane Lafleur’s third film premiered at Cannes’s Quinzaine des Réalisateurs, Toronto, Göteborg, and Vancouver, where it won Best Canadian Film. Tu Dors Nicole is a New York Times Critic’s Pick.