Friday 13 June 2014

“La Petite Reine” is riveting dope






Reviewed by Nancy Snipper

This film is based on the true story of 2004 Montreal World Cup Cycling winner, Geneviève Jeanson.  It is a terrible tale of a great athlete whose awards were illegally earned because of addiction to doping and the “high of winning”.  Her team sponsored by Vita (in reality, Rona – a Quebec hardware store chain) always wins because of their star leader, Julie Arsenault (Laurence Leboeuf). The film details how her trainer, JP (Patrice Robitaille) a nasty manipulator who is in charge of her doping, shows how he is complicit in her downward spiral from the podium to the floor; lying and covering up eventually catch up to her. Even her own doctor confesses under pressure to the Federation that she has been needling herself into success. An excellent film with superb acting and editing, director Alexis Durand has made an important film that tells the story of one of Quebec’s fallen heroes.


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