The steamiest movie of the season is also its most uncomfortable. Last Summer, which hits theaters July 28, is the first film in a decade from provocative French director Catherine Breillat. With Last Summer, she adapts 2019’s Danish film Queen of Hearts with a suspenseful sexiness that’s hard to shake. The story of a quasi-incestuous May-December romance that threatens to destroy a well-to-do family, it’s a drama expertly modulated to raise both eyebrows and pulse rates, led by a superb Léa Drucker performance that’s rooted in uncontrollable self-destructive passions and intense self-preservation instincts.
Last Summer introduces us to Anne (Drucker) grilling a teenage girl about her drinking on a given night, as well as her carnal proclivities with boys. Though this initially seems like a mother-daughter scolding, it’s slowly revealed to be a lawyer-client back-and-forth; Anne is an attorney who specializes in counseling kids in peril. Her own adopted Asian daughters Serena (Serena Hu) and Angela (Angela Chen) are far more stable than the children with whom she works, and her home life with them and husband Pierre (Olivier Rabourdin) is a luxurious and happy one.
That all changes, however, when Pierre receives a call from his ex-wife indicating that his 17-year-old son Théo (Samuel Kircher) has again gotten into trouble at school. In response, Théo comes to live with Anne and Pierre, despite the fact that the boy is bitterly estranged from his father, who was MIA during his upbringing.
