Y'all are making me uneasy...
There is no actual or implied love interest between Leon and Mathilda. All posts suggesting that should stop. Unless you are a sick pedophile, there's nothing erotic about an 11-year old.
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MovieChat Forums > Léon (1994) Discussion > Y'all are making me uneasy...
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From the Actual Script:
LEON
Mathilda? May I come in?
MATHILDA
Yes.
Leon opens the door. Mathilda is naked and is brushing her
hair. Leon closes back the door without entering.
LEON(embarrassed)
Sorry. I heard "yes", so I got in...
Mathilda opens the door. She's still combing her hair. She's
still naked.
MATHILDA
Yes... You can come in.
Leon is rigid. He takes a towel and deploys it in front of
her.
LEON
Take it, please.
She rolls herself into the towel, without speaking. Leon's
relieved.
And Later:
JENNY (surprised)
...Did you leave alone?
MATHILDA (smiling)
...No.
JENNY
(shouting)
YEAH! I was sure! Come on, tell me! I
know him?
MATHILDA
No.
JENNY
Come on, *beep* tell me! Is he beautiful?
MATHILDA (moved)
...Yes, I think.
JENNY
I can't believe it! "Yes I think"...
How she kids me! I can't believe it! And
did he pass your threshold or not?
MATHILDA
...What?
JENNY
Well... Did you sleep with him or not?
MATHILDA
No... Not yet. He's very shy... and
very sensitive.
JENNY
...Good... But what's special in him?
MATHILDA
...I don't know... It's true he touches
me. I love him.
And Finally:
Leon sweetly looks at her.
LEON (con't)
...You see, I wouldn't be a good lover,
Mathilda.
MATHILDA
Leon, I don't know life very much... I
just know I love you... And love is
stronger than anything else.
Leon is more and more nervous, like a child.
LEON
Maybe... Sure... But... I'm scared,
Mathilda.
Leon cries. Mathilda caresses his face.
MATHILDA
Don't fear, Leon. You mustn't fear
love, when it's this beautiful.
She caresses his chest.
MATHILDA (con't)
I want you to be the first to touch
me... The first to make love with me.
Nobody before you.
She stands up and modestly gets off her briefs without taking
off her dress. Leon cries, unable to oppose her. Mathilda is
too young, but she's also too beautiful and lovely and sweet
and tender... She sweetly, very sweetly, gets on him.
LEON(crying)
Why me, Mathilda, why me?
Mathilda leans over to speak in his ear.
MATHILDA
...Because you deserve it, Leon...
Leon embraces her. He's full of happiness, shame, so many
emotions, he can't control very well. But, hell, how
beautiful it is seeing them sweetly making love.
Source: http://scifiscripts.com/msol/LEON.txt
Your post is completely irrelevant to the shooting script used for the movie, to the Leon and Mathilda characters, and to the arc of the story in the film.
The script you quote was a very different story with an older girl (15-18) who happily murders an old man on a park bench with her practice rifle shot, kills a young boy who embarrasses her, and participates in killing with Leon. The Leon character is almost an exact match for Viktor in Nikita. Anyone who is inconvenient dies. They are both dysfunctional and stupid and both die in the end
When Besson chose the much younger eleven-year-old Portman, both roles were substantially changed. She became a protected innocent who never kills. The character of Leon is melded with a knight character that Reno had played in a 1993 French comedy, and the screenplay is changed from a downbeat drama to a tragicomic fantasy.
Believe what you want but this WAS once the script ergo same character(s) in this situation regardless of casting. Add to that the undertones of the movie as it was filmed and edited and it's very easy to see this could have still happened in the story off camera. I have always loved The Professional BUT it has always been a little off in the dynamic to the relationship between Mathilda and Leon. Given Besson's own personal life at the time of writing, directing and editing this film it's not a stretch of the imagination especially when viewing the Director's Cut.
shareDo you realize that the short version is his director's cut?
Actually, it is precisely "stretch of the imagination" that gives life to those who want to see a sexual component with Portman.
It doesn't matter that:
Portman was initially rejected because she was too young
when she was chosen for the part, Besson worked with her and her parents to insure the script was revised in an acceptable way
Portman's Mother was on the set at all times
Portman is on record as saying that she thoroughly understood what she was asked to do and was never exploited in any way
none of the principals (Reno, Besson, Portman) saw sex as even a possibility in their understanding of the characters in the film
the film that was actually shot was lifted almost entirely from older titles (This Gun for Hire - at the beginning, a hitman showing kindness to a young girl on a landing after a job; escaping detection with a gasmask during a massive police presence and dying with the bad guy at the end --- Gloria (1980) - mob figure saving a child in an apartment hallway whose family had just been massacred; child propositioning the adult for sex before being rejected)
major changes to scripts are routine parts of movie development
Besson never in his life had a documented sexual relationship with anyone who didn't look like and was not an independent adult in the sight of the law
Besson was one of the few French entertainment personalities who refused to sign a petition supporting Roman Polanski's freedom from further U.S. prosecution, saying that he thought Polanski should be subject to the law
Despite having three ex-wives and many French entertainment peers who don't like his American-style films and find any excuse they can to criticize him, there has never been a scandal associated with his handling of children.
Some people still want, need, dream about some nasty purpose, or un-shown footage, or behind scenes leering at Portman, or that they themselves are being unnaturally tempted to have bad thoughts.
I'm going to stop discussing this now because it seems painfully obvious to me that even though it was the script, then later changed, that seems to matter not to you and makes the complete script, that the final shooting script was based off, null and void. You don't see the original script to play any part in this even though very clearly it does. The "directors cut" was Besson's original theatrical cut even though in the grand scheme of things that makes no sense in comparison to damn near every other movie having a "director's cut". The International version (which I own) is my reference point to the film (I have watched both several times) and even though the Americian/Directors Cut/Theatrical version is shorter and less shall we say prone to overt sexuality of a minor/adult nature it is still there especially when watching the longer international version which to be fair was also directed at the same time as all of the other footage that was shot to make that movie. Ergo you have one story. If you were to look at it in book form you have the copy that is missing 22 and 1/2 pages but it still makes a coherent story that takes place in the same universe to the same people but in a slightly different way. My copy has those other 22 and 1/2 pages that fills in some gaps you didn't even know they were there. It is still canon. It is still part of the actual story and saying that one version is the correct version to support your argument while ignoring the other version of the exact same film that has another 22:28 minutes of footage (some of which deals specifically with more of the overt sexual undertones of this entire discussion)is ridiculous. Should we ignore longer versions of the same film or shorter ones? Should deleted scenes be given credit to canon if it doesn't change the overarching storyline? Most importantly should only the American versions of films be the "correct" ones? Because it sounds to me like that is exactly what you are saying. Agree to disagree.
First, you want to insist that the script that wasn't used for the film has more to do with what the film intended than the script that was used for the film. In fact, that the script that wasn't used was the only meaningful source.
Second, you want to insist that because some other directors call later editions of their films director's cuts, that a director claiming to have made the film that he wanted for the theatrical release must be insane. the short edition was the only edition available anywhere in the world until the extended edition was released in 1996. It wasn't ever just an American cut in 1994. Actually, directors creating bloated editions and calling them director's cuts is a recent and ugly fad. Besson is more normal in not doing that.
Third, even his extended edition goes no further sexually than the director's cut. the main thing it does is have her go with Leon to kill people and celebrate afterwards. If you had any sense of the real story arc in the film, namely, Leon protecting her childhood, it would be obvious that her participation and enjoyment of the killing game didn't help and was a logical cut.
Fourth, if you know Besson's 1995 book about the film, then you also know that he specifically notes that the original script wasn't used beyond the set-up. You also have Reno's, Portman's, and Besson's thinking processes about the characters and making the film. All of which blow your theory out of the water
Fifth and finally, I agree that we are unlikely to change each other's minds, but it isn't because I have not read the original script, Besson's books about the film and others of his films, and many other sources, and seen each of his feature films, it is that you have tunnel vision for the few things you want to believe and will not even try to view the larger picture of his life, film history, and treatment of others.
>>> I'm going to stop discussing this now
Ha! You're debating with someone I have on ignore. I can imagine what things he's saying. Stop wasting your time, bro!
Evacuation Com
No offense to DFC-2 or anything.Everyone has opinions; myself included. I've been known to hold-fast to my opinions and have tunnel vision so I get that pattern. I like to keep a mantra in the back of my mind every time I talk on a message board online. "In the entire history of the internet those opinions which have been changed is zero." If we all agreed on everything this would would be a very boring place. Passion is the spice of life and I enjoy a good debate even if nothing is solved or gained. Cheers.
share'dehietyi' - Without taking sides I must say bringing in a script from a different movie, one that was not made, doesn't add clarity to the discussion. The only script that is relevant for this discussion is the one the movie was actually filmed from, the one written for the much younger Mathilda. The fact that Besson had an older character in mind initially, one that would initiate sex with Leon, in no way implies any actions or intents for the character that was actually filmed.
..*.. TxMike ..*..
Sometimes I think we're alone in the universe, and sometimes not.
I was pretty much done with this discussion but I'll elaborate on the points I was trying to make. I've written scripts. I've read scripts. I understand story structure and how it relates to an overarching theme. This in no way makes me a professional writer or that I have some special clout that would make my opinions more "true" but I do think it should lend credence to my understanding of story structure and prose.
In my personal opinion going all the way back to 1994 when I first watched The Professional (Leon: The Professional didn't become the title till the extended cut here in the US) I noticed some (shall we say) hint's or leanings to a potentially sexual ideology in the relationship between Mathilda and Leon. In all fairness it was one-sided and barely touched upon (not trying to make a joke here honestly) but again in my opinion it was there. Even before I ever penned my first script or read a screenplay I noticed it.
I'm not saying it is a bad movie (personally it is one of my favorite all-time films and honestly my favorite Gary Oldman film) but I think there is a leftover sexual component in the actual film. I wanted to use the original script as more of a reference that, in the original story, this relationship actually existed on that level. In my writing (and I'd like to assume many other authors do this as well) once the groundwork for a story is in your head you tend to sprinkle bits and pieces of that subtext in everything that makes up the dynamic.
While I will completely agree that the original script and the filmed script are widely different (especially in the dynamic of Mathilda and Leon) and changed to match the actors and the ages of said actors the overarching story by and large is very similar. For example when they go to the hotel and she has the conversation with the front desk manager and he refers to Leon as her father she corrects him and says lover. Obviously this causes issues which moves them and the story along. There is a scene reminiscent of the original script where she is lying on his bed kind of clutching her stomach as if having butterflies and thinking of Leon. Even some of the interactions with her and Leon (completely on her end) are symbolic of a girl wanting more than what is socially acceptable. Leon throughout all of this either doesn't respond in kind or completely shuts her down.
Again these are just my personal opinions but that is what I see. Every time I watch The Professional I still enjoy the movie and I try to ignore those observations but I think it is nothing more than a leftover relationship subtext that wasn't completely written out. My only real observation in all of these discussions is that if Besson, Reno and Portman +family really wanted to make sure that the original script and story was changed to reflect the removal of the relationship dynamic why then did some of this subtext still bleed through? From everything a lot of you had said it was imperative that Portman's parents, Reno and Besson remove all traces of that relationship dynamic.
A nice thing about fiction is each viewer has the option of interpreting certain things the way they want. But I can never agree with your POV on this movie for the simple reason that it is art, and artists sometimes start with one set of concepts and their completed work ends up being something quite different. We can't pull up their prior drafts and say they are necessarily relevant.
I don't know if you've ever been to the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame in Cleveland, but it has many different artifacts representing the music many of us grew up with. I remember one display in particular, it was the handwritten copy of a famous song, I believe "Bridge Over Troubled Waters." Might have been a different song, it was a few years ago.
But the fascinating part to me was how certain things were crossed out and written differently, to finally arrive at the lyrics we all know and love. It is part of the creative process, and the words or phrases that were crossed out are not relevant.
That is what Besson did with his movie. I suspect all of his movies. Just as famous painters did when they made several sketches before selecting the one that became their famous work of art.
..*.. TxMike ..*..
Sometimes I think we're alone in the universe, and sometimes not.
>>> Even some of the interactions with her and Leon (completely on her end)
This is the only point of your excellent post with which I disagree. In the final 1/3 of the movie, Leon subtly but unmistakably moves from having 0 romantic interest in Mathilda to developing a definite interest.
As just one example: when he rescues her in the DEA office, the expression on his face and his body language as they embrace is decidedly not paternal or platonic.
And in his final speech to Mathilda, which all people who hurl the pedo sobriquet at anyone who sees something unwholesome in his film perforce completely ignore (is that actually the only time in the movie where he says more than 8 syllables?), any honest reading of that speech leaves absolutely no doubt whatsoever that he is now finally ready to engage in the type of romantic relationship Mathilda wanted all along, and which they would have embarked on had he lived.
I'm not saying it would have been sexual only -- she truly loves him and he now truly loves her -- but it certainly would have included that element.
Evacuation Com
For whatever it may be worth, I completely agree with everything you say about the film, but have no problem at all, nor did Portman or her parents, with Besson showing the sexual risk-taking of her young character. Besson goes out of his way to use sexual symbolism (e.g. her pose on the landing, her grasping two of Leon's fingers, her interaction with the hotel clerk). Portman actually added in the Madonna and Marilyn Monroe skits on her own. All Besson asked her to do was Gene Kelly.
To me, however, this was akin to the young girl in American Graffiti, it was all innocent gaming, an attempt to astonish/horrify the otherwise bored Leon/John Milner. In terms of film references, there was a little of Velda's fruitless interactions with Mike Hammer in Kiss Me Deadly.
http://www.clubecinema.com/images/1955/13134-Kiss-Me-Deadly--1955-.jpg
To me, there is a vast difference between a young girl mimicking the vamping of an adult, akin perhaps to boys playing with toy guns or looking tough, and a film suggesting that an adult taking advantage of such a child was not only okay but something beautiful (something Louis Malle did with Pretty Baby).
The unfortunate fate of Besson's film with some is that Portman as a child was attractive enough to some that they wanted to take her playacting seriously, not like the lonely little girl in 12 and Holding or the young girl in American Graffiti or the boy in Cassavetes' <i>Gloria</I>, but rather like the already auctioned whore's daughter with the photographer in the Malle film.
Besson always denied and continues to deny that he was going for the latter, as has Reno and Portman, and I see no reason to assume otherwise. Especially since he included the original script in his book about the film, noting the changes he made to the original plan and why it made sense to him and actually energized him in a away the original script did not.
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>>> All posts suggesting that should stop.
What arrogance.
>>> there's nothing erotic about an 11-year old.
Ssdly, you fail to grasp the distinction between:
(a) finding an 11-year-old erotic
and
(b) observing that someone else is portraying an 11-year-old in suggestive situations.
Evacuation Com
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I disagree with the OP. There is definitely a Love interest between Leon and Mathilda. The film never tries to hide this fact and we see it more clearly as the story unfolds. What kind of Love has always been the question and remains the most popular topic for discussion.
shareyou know, other than the part where they literally say i love you to each other. oh yeah and the time matilda tried to have sex with him
shareThis is craziness!
He has a horrible empty life and she has a horrible empty life due to her criminal parents. They find each other and have family type of love, not sexual.
Leon is willing to die for her like a father would for his daughter.
Leon also wants to save a plant!!
He's like the character Roy in Blade Runner who has seen lots of death, is dying, and comes to value life very much.
It's just because Portman is pretty that people think sex, but honestly after watching the film, how can you say that?
HE loves her like family. Matilda mistakes this for sexual love. seriously how did you all miss this
shareAnyone that can't see a Love Interest between Leon and Mathilda, is totally missing the story altogether.A Love Interest is definitely there for all to see. The argument has always been and remains, was it Sexual, Paternal or Platonic? No matter what name you give it a Love Interest exists between them. The entire story evolves around this premise. I personally don't see it as Sexual, neither can I give it a name, and maybe that was Besson's intention when he wrote the script.
shareIt wouldn't be crazy for her to love him romantically, but not sexually as she is too little to know what that is and didn't appear to be in puberty yet. However, she grew up in a rejecting kind of family and some girls become hyper sexual because of that, but still I think she's too little.
Anyway, what I previously said about Leon is the main point as he's the main character. He clearly loves and values the plant, thus he's in love with life after having been caught up with death all the time. Same theme in Blade Runner.
I guess none of you saw the deleted scene where Leon has sex with the plant.
Evacuation Com
Nonsense. While he loves her as a daughter, she absolutely is in love with him.
This isn't perverted, and it isn't uncommon for an 11-year old girl, to have a crush on an adult, that will naturally never lead to anything more. It's not all that different from young kids/teens being in love with celebrities.
Make sure to watch the international version, which is 23 minutes longer than the theatrical version. I hear some of the scenes about the relationship were removed in the shorter version.
There absolutely is a love interest between them. Not from his side, other than loving her as one would a daughter, but she directly tells that she's in love with him.
There is nothing perverted or pedophile about this. It's not even uncommon for a young girl to have a crush on an adult. It's not that different from them being in love with celebrity idols. It passes.
Maybe you only watched the theatrical version, where some of the scenes, that make this clear, were removed. Try watching the international version, which is 23 minutes longer.