A friend who’s far smarter than I mentioned recently that around ten percent of the population lives their lives somewhere on the LGBTQIA spectrum. Then, according to Pew Research, approximately 1.6% of people think of themselves as either trans or non-binary. More and more people know someone in their lives that’s trans. But quite a few people don’t. Oftentimes, there’s a reason for that.

Could you imagine if it was you? From early childhood, you always had a feeling that the gender you were assigned at birth was wrong. To deal with that, you’d take the first steps toward living the right way for yourself. Who could possibly object? As it turns out, an awful lot of people will make your business their business. It must feel like something out of Kafka, a waking nightmare that you can’t escape. When you do try, when you speak up for yourself, make decisions you know are the right ones, what’s the response? Condescension. Disgust. Violence that’s often perpetrated by people who ostentatiously claim to be Christian.

That’s the lived experience for quite a few trans people these days. At least, that’s how I understand it, and bear in mind that, as a straight, white guy, my understanding of the lived experience of trans people only covers the tip of the proverbial iceberg. I like to think I’m a fairly flexible thinker, but we’re all prisoners in a way. Prisoners of our generations, our upbringing, our cultures.

Culture should be on the side of trans people. They should be able to live their lives without incident, particularly in a country obsessed with freedom. The bad news is, we’re not there yet, not even close. The good news is, despite the best efforts of the ignorant and fearful, culture is moving in the direction of trans acceptance. How do I know this? Because I know that cinema is art, and art is always at the top of the cultural river. The proof I have and the proof you need is Lola, a Belgian film of great power and great sensitivity.

Lola (Mya Bollaers) has just turned eighteen. Like all eighteen year olds, she’s at a turning point in her life. Unlike all eighteen year olds, she’s been living in a foster shelter in Belgium for the past two years. She’s a trans woman who was thrown out of her home by her father, Phillippe (Benoit Magimel). 

They say that man plans and God laughs. Lola’s plan, upon hitting her eighteenth, is to have sex reassignment surgery done and fully transition to who she is. Her mother quietly supports her with visits and unconditional love. She might not have her father, but her best friend Samir (Sami Outalbali) always has her back. Lola can see a path, one where she’s a veterinary technician, an adult, and a woman living a life on her own. 

Then her mother dies. A vital part of Lola’s support system disappears, along with around six thousand Euros that Lola planned to use to pay for her surgery.* Insult is added to injury when Lola misses the funeral. Why? Phillippe gives her the wrong time. Will Lola be deterred that easily? She will not. She storms into the funeral reception and gives Phillippe more than a few pieces of her mind. Then Lola takes the urn containing her mother’s ashes.

Phillippe pursues Lola. He has his own plans, which were to take the ashes on a road trip to scatter them at the Belgian coast. They reach a standoff, and reluctantly agree to journey to the coast together and say goodbye to the woman they loved. 

Sometimes, the best move a director can make is to not get in the way of the script. That’s the decision made here by director Laurent Micheli. He doesn’t use flashy shots or ostentatious edits to jump up and down and yell, “Hey, look at me! I’m a visionary!” Don’t misunderstand me, Micheli knows how to put together good shots, and his usage of moonlit roadways and the gorgeous Belgian coast is bold without being obnoxious. His pacing is brisk when it needs to be, yet he knows to linger on the character moments that count. 

Where Micheli truly excels is as a screenwriter. He focuses on the fraught relationship between Lola and Phillippe, one battered by severe resentment and mistrust. Better yet is that Micheli’s characters are fully formed and fully flawed. A lesser film would have portrayed Lola as an earthbound saint and Phillippe as a mouth breathing bigot. Not so here, and both characters have points of view that are understandable and moments of behavior that are maddening. That’s just how people are.

While the cast is uniformly solid, at its core this is a two-hander. Mya Bollaers portrays Lola as fiercely independent and more than a little bullheaded. She has zero interest in educating her father, particularly when he’s constantly misgendering her. Her stubbornness has helped her to survive, and it’s a continuous stumbling block. That stubbornness apparently runs in the family. As Phillippe, Benoit Magimel plays a man that isn’t necessarily a bigot. He’s someone with a rigid mindset, and he’s continuously baffled to learn that Lola takes hormones and is prepping for a significant operation.** In the end, Lola doesn’t seem to want her father to be a genuine ally. All she wants is a little respect to be who she is. 

Ten years after the events of Lola, I could see these characters becoming genuinely closer. I could also see them drifting apart, the gulf caused by too little common ground. People like Lola will go on, live their lives unencumbered. They need not change to fit the whims of the ignorant and fearful. The future always moves forward. People like Phillippe have a choice to make – adapt or die. The past always stays behind. 

 

*I couldn’t help but chuckle when Lola is faced with the almost insurmountable obstacle of needing 6,000 Euro. To put it in perspective, here in the United States, sex reassignment procedures can start at $15,000 for people without insurance. If America is supposed to be the greatest country in the world, shouldn’t it have the greatest health care?

**You know the kind of people that can rattle off twenty years of stats for a baseball team, but they’re constantly confused about what to call “the gays?” That’s Phillippe. 



Tim Brennan
Tim has been alarmingly enthusiastic about movies ever since childhood. He grew up in Boulder and, foolishly, left Colorado to study Communications in Washington State. Making matters worse, he moved to Connecticut after meeting his too-good-for-him wife. Drawn by the Rockies and a mild climate, he triumphantly returned and settled down back in Boulder County. He's written numerous screenplays, loves hiking, and embarrassed himself in front of Samuel L. Jackson. True story.  
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