REELING

French dancers reckon with the abuse they experienced as teenagers.

In mid-1980s Paris, 13-year-old Cléo is captivated by modern jazz. Her desire to become a professional dancer and her parents' obliviousness lead to her being recruited by older woman Cathy, who tells Cléo that she can apply for a grant to pay for dancing costs from the Galatea Foundation if she can be mature enough to get through the application process. Cléo is also asked to identify other girls who should apply, and she suggests Betty, a charismatic classmate with "amber skin" who's acutely aware of the racism within the world of dance. Cléo remains haunted for years by her interactions with middle-aged men at the foundation's auditions and by her part in recruiting Betty. The following chapters explore what happened to Cléo and Betty through the eyes of people around them—a school friend, a dance teacher, a girlfriend, a nephew—over the 35 years following their traumatic teenage experiences and the fallout from the investigation into the Galatea Foundation as part of the #MeToo movement. French novelist Lafon explores the toxic culture of dance and systems set up to exploit young girls filled with the desire for approval, those who live with “having said yes because we didn’t know how to say no,” as one later tells a documentary filmmaker. The swirl of characters surrounding and sharing their perceptions of Cléo and Betty at times makes it difficult to follow the two characters, especially as the momentum of the sections is uneven. Yet the deep relevance and the nuanced portrayal of the myriad effects of abuse on their lives are skillfully done.

Layered and disquieting.