Camile (Samuel Kircher) appears destined for great things. At his sports boarding school in France, he’s the great boxing hope, expected to make it to the Euros. He also has a love for nature and a fascination with the foxes in the forest that surround the school. When trying to track one of the foxes with his friend Matteo (Faycal Anaflous), Camile slips and falls ten feet down a sheer cliff face. The injuries it leaves him with are more than just physical – but in the unsympathetic world of pre-professional sports, he is offered little support.
Sports dramas often emphasise the gruelling, even cruel, ordeals that athletes go through to reach the top. Similarly, any film with a storyline about an individual exceptional in their field makes sure to stress the sacrifices they have to make. In his feature debut, director Valéry Carnoy draws on both these threads while taking on popular themes of toxic masculinity and broken families.
In a world where psychological care in competitive settings is increasingly focused on, particularly when it comes to children and young adults, the tone of Wild Foxes feels slightly outdated. The staff at this school are so inconsiderate of the fact that a serious injury may be somewhat traumatising, or may have effects that can’t be seen on an MRI scan, that it’s almost laughable. Coach Bogdan (Jean-Baptiste Durand) is more concerned with the inter-school competitions (which don’t seem to bring in much of an audience) than Camille’s rapidly deteriorating mental state or the bullying rampant across the team. It’s not that this is an implausible story, exactly, but the complete lack of pushback from any caretaker characters on this ethos jars somewhat.
Where the cruelty is more successfully rendered is between the students. Conversations between them are comfortably familiar and feel like something you could overhear between any group of teenagers. Their confidence and tendency to amplify and exaggerate give them a veracity, reinforcing the casual cruelty of their environment and the constant need for one-upmanship.
“Gotta say, it’s fire,” one classmate says, seeing the giant scar up Camile’s arm when he returns to school from the hospital. Little is made of his near-death experience, neither by him nor others around him. As young athletes, there’s a sense of immortality about them – a naivety that Camile seems to have surpassed as he grows increasingly distressed by acts of violence.
Very little is shown about these characters outside of their sports. A few brief comments are made about poor relationships with fathers, but there’s not much to latch on to. While this cements the idea that their training is all-consuming, it also makes it challenging to connect with them. Yas (Anna Heckel) offers a welcome respite from the monomania of Camile and the boxing team. While she is studying taekwondo at the school, she is also a talented musician, and refers to the radical idea that maybe a person can enjoy more than one thing at once. It’s a bit High School Musical, but Heckel brings a depth and interiority to the role that really stands out.
Wild Foxes is a quiet story, one that is never quite wrangled enough to be fully satisfying. Its messages may not be radical, but the story is solid, and it acts as an excellent showcase for its young stars.
★★★
In UK and Irish cinemas from 1st May 2026 / Samuel Kircher, Faycal Anaflous, Jean-Baptiste Durand, Anna Heckel / Dir: Valéry Carnoy / Conic / 15
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