Counting on Beautiful Yet Painful Memories of the Past with ‘Adeline’

France GL Recaps

2023-10-26
13:00

Have you ever experienced forbidden love? Adeline has experienced it and suffered through it all, in the name of love.

In her old age, Adeline stays in a hospice and is assigned a new attendant. The chief aide stated that the old Adeline has stage three lymphoma and does not have long to live.

As she lifelessly eats, her hospice aide lays down all of the new mail that came for her, which is mostly her utility bills. However, her world seemingly stopped when she heard that a certain Helene Gautier sent her mail. It was like being transported back in the day…

Adeline was sitting in the room. She’s wearing her school uniform, mouth tightly closed, hair ruffled. She was being punished by her nun teacher because she was chewing gum. The nun’s patience runs out, saying that “proper young women do not chew gum”. She, then, forcibly puts her hand on Adeline’s mouth so she ends up swallowing it.

Adeline and the rest of the students seem to be used to the abuse. But her oasis comes with a classmate, a fellow girl. They both lock themselves in a cubicle and shared a drink through a flask… and a kiss.

The old Adeline passes out.

Back in the current time, the hospice aide tended to old Adeline, asking the chief aide if they can call Adeline’s family, but there was no one in her file.

The old Adeline picks up the letter she got from Helen. A photo fell from it, showing their old photo together. Adeline asks the hospice aid if she can read the letter to her. Helen wrote about some of their memories in the catholic school together.

But not all are good memories. Adeline remembered when, while sharing an intimate moment with Helen back when they were in the school, that they were caught kissing by a fellow student. She, of course, reported the incident to the scary nun, which led to a midnight raid from her to the female students in the dorm room. The nun went straight to Adeline and asked her to pack her belongings, stating how “horrible” homosexuality is. Adeline broke down and cried as her classmates looked on. The nun asked her who she was kissing, but Adeline declined to say Helen’s name. But Helen could not really contain her emotions and the nun ended up being convinced that it was Helen whom Adeline was kissing. Helen shook her head in denial, but she was still persecuted by the nun.

As the aide was reading the letter, as requested by Adeline, however, someone came in the room. It was Helen, and she quickly goes to Adeline’s side, held her hand, and kissed it.

Finally, they are reunited.

Writer’s thoughts:

The short but harrowing depiction of the lesbian film ‘Adeline’ reminds us of the time when homosexuality was treated as a disease. Although in some cases and countries, it could still be the same, objectively, situations have eased up even a little bit. Adeline and Helen had a pure and innocent love which was demonized by the very institution of catholicism, the nun. Because of this, she had to bear the weight of losing the love of her life at such a young age, and ended up having no one to be with as she was in her dying stage. This film can clearly pull heartstrings, and definitely worth a watch, especially to young queer women.

Watch ‘Adeline‘ on GagaOOLala! You can now enjoy lesbian and other queer shows on a bigger screen by downloading the GagaOOLala app on your Smart TVs through Google Play, Amazon App Store, or Roku.