About the Film

Léo is young, hot and gay — a sex worker surviving the mean streets of Strasbourg, France. Sex, drugs and pain predominate. Love and tenderness are in short supply.

In Sauvage/Wild Writer-Director Vidal-Naquet depicts this underground world of male hustlers in dispassionate detail: older, lonely tricks; young studs; graphic sex scenes with casual humiliation.

One stands out: vulnerable Léo (Félix Maritaud) who works the wooded roads on the outskirts of town with a gang that includes Ahd (Eric Bernard), a “gay for pay” bi-buddy with a sugar daddy who pays the bills. Ahd urges Léo to find someone similar, but Léo’s in love with Ahd and hopes one day his feelings will be reciprocated. 

Unlike Ahd, who plans to leave hustling behind, Léo doesn’t think about his future. “It’s like you enjoy being a whore,” Ahd scoffs.

When the gang discovers that a new hustler (Nicolas Dibla), an Eastern European immigrant, is offering bjs at a price cheaper than the going rate, the men erupt in violence. Léo is the only one who comes to the newcomer’s aid, and yet his help is not repaid in kind. 

Although it’s the most sexually explicit film of this year’s festival, most critics agree there is more to Sauvage/Wild than M4M sex: “Gut-punchingly authentic with radiant moments of tenderness” (Screen International); “Raw, uncompromising and yet strangely romantic.” (The Hollywood Reporter).

The director’s nonjudgmental approach and the outstanding acting should keep audiences invested in Léo’s journey. And when a sensitive, caring trick offers Léo a helping hand — similar to Léo’s gesture earlier — it could make all the difference in the life of this lost soul. If he is willing to accept it.

Director: Camille Vidal-Naquet