An early film on AIDS but the case considered here makes the subject extremely tender and touching. It is an 11 year old BOY who has AIDS and got it from some medical treatment. That was common at the beginning of the epidemic. Of course some neighbourhood kids accuse the child of being gay with nice words like "fag" thrown at him as if it could in anyway be possible.
But the interest of the film is the relationship this sick child, Dexter, is going to build with his next door neighbour who is slightly older but alone with his mother like Dexter. This neighbour, Erik, is looking for a friend for the summer and he assumes the situation in which Dexter is naturally but with a tremendous optimism trying by all means to find a cure in some plants, concocting all kinds of potions for his friend.
But the best side of the story is how these two boys develop a loving relationship that makes them adventurous, courageous, even reckless, just to get a cure for the disease or to get to New Orleans where there supposedly is some doctor who would have a cure. The whole adventure becomes some kind of Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer down the Mississippi all over again, though in slightly different conditions.
This love between the two boys is in fact a threesome in a way since there is always a third character, the disease itself that haunts Dexter, that possesses Dexter and at the same time that entirely controls Erik, his reactions, his care, his tricks and pranks on nurses and doctors. Erik's mother is just a prop but Dexter's mother is also extremely important in her patience, in the way she accompanies Dexter to his final destination and accepts the love between the two boys and the silly antics they do together just because it might be the last chance Dexter has to experience some pleasure, some happiness.
And the end is a miracle in a way. The two boys decide to play a trick on a doctor again, Dexter pretending he is dead in order to resuscitate and frighten the doctor. But that was one time too many and this time the doctor confirms the diagnosis which is this time no longer a trick. That kind of end is so cool, so natural, so peaceful we just wonder if that is not the miracle a doctor spoke of before: going out on tiptoe as discreetly as possible like an angel in the sky.
Those two boys and Dexter's mother seem to give us a tremendous lesson when we are confronted to a disease that does not want to be cured. Patience, calm and receptivity seem to be the needed cure when there is no other.
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU
But the interest of the film is the relationship this sick child, Dexter, is going to build with his next door neighbour who is slightly older but alone with his mother like Dexter. This neighbour, Erik, is looking for a friend for the summer and he assumes the situation in which Dexter is naturally but with a tremendous optimism trying by all means to find a cure in some plants, concocting all kinds of potions for his friend.
But the best side of the story is how these two boys develop a loving relationship that makes them adventurous, courageous, even reckless, just to get a cure for the disease or to get to New Orleans where there supposedly is some doctor who would have a cure. The whole adventure becomes some kind of Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer down the Mississippi all over again, though in slightly different conditions.
This love between the two boys is in fact a threesome in a way since there is always a third character, the disease itself that haunts Dexter, that possesses Dexter and at the same time that entirely controls Erik, his reactions, his care, his tricks and pranks on nurses and doctors. Erik's mother is just a prop but Dexter's mother is also extremely important in her patience, in the way she accompanies Dexter to his final destination and accepts the love between the two boys and the silly antics they do together just because it might be the last chance Dexter has to experience some pleasure, some happiness.
And the end is a miracle in a way. The two boys decide to play a trick on a doctor again, Dexter pretending he is dead in order to resuscitate and frighten the doctor. But that was one time too many and this time the doctor confirms the diagnosis which is this time no longer a trick. That kind of end is so cool, so natural, so peaceful we just wonder if that is not the miracle a doctor spoke of before: going out on tiptoe as discreetly as possible like an angel in the sky.
Those two boys and Dexter's mother seem to give us a tremendous lesson when we are confronted to a disease that does not want to be cured. Patience, calm and receptivity seem to be the needed cure when there is no other.
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU