''The Fox and the Child'' ( French: ''Le renard et l'enfant'') is a 2007 French

direct-to-video Direct-to-video or straight-to-video refers to the release of a film, TV series, short or special to the public immediately on home video formats rather than an initial theatrical release or television premiere. This distribution strategy wa ...

family Family (from la, familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its members and of society. Idea ...

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super ...

directed by

Luc Jacquet Luc Jacquet (born 5 December 1967) is a French film director and screenwriter. He wrote and directed the film ''March of the Penguins'', which won an Oscar for Best Documentary Feature in 2005 and received a nomination for the Writers Guild of ...

. Starring Bertille Noël-Bruneau, Isabelle Carré and Thomas Laliberté. The English version of the film is narrated by Kate Winslet. It tells the story of a young girl who explores through a forest looking for a

fox Foxes are small to medium-sized, omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull, upright, triangular ears, a pointed, slightly upturned snout, and a long bushy tail (or ''brush''). Twelve sp ...

Plot

A young girl who's about 10 years old lives in a farm house in the Jura mountains in eastern France. One day in autumn, when she rides her bicycle to school through the forest, she observes a

hunting. Of course, the fox escapes, but the girl yearns to meet the animal again. During the following months, the girl spends most of her free time in the forest trying to find the fox, but she doesn't meet it again until winter arrives. During the winter, she follows the fox's tracks far across the fields. Suddenly she compares her hand to the size of the tracks near those she is following and discovers they are relatively fresh wolf tracks. She is alarmed as a wolf pack begins howling near her. She runs away panicked, falls and hurts her ankle. The ankle heals very slowly, so that she has to stay at home during the winter reading a book about foxes and other animals of the forest. When spring arrives, the girl is looking for foxholes and waits for the fox, who she eventually names Lily. The fox has young babies and moves from one foxhole to another because of the girl's inquisitiveness; so the girl decides to observe the fox from a greater distance. The girl finds the fox again and tries to get the animal accustomed to her. She feeds it meat. Later she can even touch the fox and is led to the new den. Finally, the fox comes to her house and she lets it inside, wanting to show it her bedroom. But the fox becomes distressed at not being able to find a way out and escapes by smashing through the brittle plate glass window, shattering the glass. The fox is hurt badly but survives. The girl learns that she cannot keep wild animals as pets at home as they are unpredictable and are not possessions. Years later she tells the whole story to her son, as seen at the end of the film. Some versions (DVD English) replace this scene with an illustration.

About the film

The film was shot on the ''Plateau de Retord'' in

Ain Ain (, ; frp, En) is a department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region in Eastern France. Named after the Ain river, it is bordered by the Saône and Rhône rivers. Ain is located on the country's eastern edge, on the Swiss border, where ...

, which the film director knows well because he spent his youth there, in the summer, as well as in the Abruzzo in

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

. The foxes in the film were played by six animals: Titus, Sally, Ziza, Scott, Tango and Pitchou. Titus was the fox who had been tamed by Marie-Noëlle Baroni. It died on March 17, 2008 at the advanced age of 12 years.

Nominations

Young Artist Award The Young Artist Award (originally known as the Youth in Film Award) is an accolade presented by the Young Artist Foundation, a nonprofit organization founded in 1978 to honor excellence of youth performers, and to provide scholarships for young ...

** 1. Nomination for "Best Performance in an International Feature Film - Leading Young Performer": Bertille Noël-Bruneau ** 2. Nomination for "Best International Feature Film"

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Fox and The Child, The 2007 films 2007 direct-to-video films 2000s adventure drama films 2000s direct-to-video films French drama films 2000s French-language films English-language French films Films about foxes Films set in France 2007 drama films Films directed by Luc Jacquet 2000s French films