Courageous is often discussed in relation to an absence of fear, rather than its true meaning regarding a power over fear. To children, the courageous are those who understand the world. The adults they see who are able to control the scary parts of their lives, and turn it into something manageable. For children, their first glimpse at the courageous are often their parents. Jasmin Gordon’s feature film, aptly titled The Courageous, presents us with a mother not often seen on screen, Jule, a single mom raising a girl and two boys, yearning for a better life but unable to follow the path set out by a controlling society that will lead her to one. Despite this, she raises her kids to be thoughtful, kind, and above all, love their mother. Wonderfully crafted to capture the natural world surrounding our small family, Gordon’s film is a reminder of the support that communities often lack for those deemed “not worth it”, and how motherhood is nothing but flaws, trials, and insurmountable love all coexisting at the same time.

The Courageous follows June, a single mother of three, Claire, Loïc, and Sami, as she struggles to work and provide for her children while also being the courageous mother they know her to be. Her past is difficult, and her future is always a point of tension, and due to the welfare situation that is no help to June or her family, things are tough. With a compelling portrayal of moral integrity, at the hands of a complex woman forced to make the wrong decisions for the right reasons, we watch her life from the point of view of her children, who are the only reason she has for anything.

Set in Switzerland, the film has a fascinating job of dismantling perceptions of this country, known as one of the richest in the world, with a high quality of living. Shots that linger on the woods, images of mountains and nature surrounding out characters, Gordon places June and her family in the centre. A mother who struggles to pay rent, who can afford one drink to be shared between three children in the diner, who must shoplift from the supermarket to afford a birthday loaf. A single mother struggling to make ends meet, in what some would call the best country to live in. It reminds us that even in a place like Switzerland, income inequality and poverty still exist, and even systems in one of the “greatest places on Earth” could use a fixing up, in favour of those like June.

I was impressed by the subtle ways Gordon’s film reminds us of the ways hierarchies are kept in place in our daily lives, not isolated to one specific place. Lingering shots on a car parked at no cost, followed later in the film by the same car, parked in the same spot, now sitting next to a parking meter demanding money in exchange for what used to be free. A speeding camera, meaning safer roads for most, but a ticket and fine at the expense of a struggling family for a select few. The main focus of the film is the children, Claire, Loïc, and Sami, and how they experience life without a full grasp of the financial challenges and mental tolls their mother is facing. But with glimpses into the changing world, and how the increased monetization of daily life impacts mothers like June, we struggle to grasp, much like the children do, how a world could let people live like this, without the support they need.

This is to say, Gordon never presents June as a perfect person. She steals and she lies, and with snarky comments made to her ever relating to her past, it is clear to say she is far from one. Instead, we are always reminded of June’s identity as a mother. Everything we see her do, we can’t help but think of Claire, Loïc, and Sami, back home, waiting for their mother to return. Much like The Florida Project, we are constantly shown the poor decisions a mother like June could make, but always presented in a way that understands that these last-resort decisions are for their own children’s well-beings, forced to steal and lie by a society who has turned the other way.

I am always so stunned to see children performers shine in film. The children, Jasmine Kalisz Saurer, Paul Besnier, and Arthur Devaux, who play Claire, Loïc, and Sami are wonderful, infusing this film with the childish and naive point of view that the screenplay offers. The reactions portrayed by these young actors to their mother, each other, and those around them all tell so much of the story and their past, left up to the viewer to interpret and understand. Along side them is the magnificent Ophelia Kolb, who portrays their mother June with such respect and understanding. In her moments of silence, along with the children in the car, or in tense situations where she is forced to think for both herself and her children, Kolb seems to intimately know June, and a society that would let her situation come to this.

Jasmine Gordon’s The Courageous is anything but a typical story of a mother and her children. It challenges the depiction of motherhood so many of us are used to see on screen, and portrays questions of moral integrity on screen in a complex way that mirrors what so many mothers often have to face, regardless of whether they are like June. Set in the gorgeous mountains of Switzerland, the film expertly crafts every shot to rmind us of the ways that our world is slowly changing to become more inaccessible by the day, especially to those in low-income homes. Along with all of this, Gordon shows us what true courage is, and how June can be seen as one the courageous ones, through the eyes of her children.

The Courageous was screened at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival. Image courtesy of TIFF.