Mark Kermode, Observer film critic 

Les combattants review – outlaw humour meets heartfelt emotion

Kévin Azaïs and Adèle Haenel bring wit and warmth to this tale of young love and survivalism
  
  

les combattants review
Paradise lost? Adèle Haenel and Kévin Azaïs in Les combattants. Photograph: BAC films Photograph: BAC films

Here’s a love story with a difference. When easy-going Arnaud (Kévin Azaïs) meets feisty combatant Madeleine (Adèle Haenel), he decides to follow her on to a “super-hard” army training course. Convinced that the end is nigh, Madeleine is a survivalist force of nature – tough, determined, undeterred. But when the pair take off into the woods, their isolated relationship takes an unexpected turn, Edenic dreams turning to existential End Times.

Retitled Love at First Fight in some territories, this enchanting French oddity (which picked up numerous Cannes and César awards) boasts terrifically likable performances from Haenel and Azaïs, who bring wit and warmth to their respective outsider roles. Offering a much-needed alternative to traditional romantic models, this has outlaw humour to spare but never moves too far away from heartfelt emotion. The dramatic final act is audacious, yet wholly in keeping with the film’s bubbling themes of love and war.

 

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