班比 Bambi (2013)

Bambi was born Jean-Pierre Pruvot in a tiny Algerian village in 1935. Even as a child, she refused to meet the expectations of her extended family, choosing instead to find a way to become the woman she always knew herself to be. A Cabaret Carrousel de Paris performance in Algiers in the 1950s proved to be all the encouragement she needed to emigrate to the French capital, assume the stage name of ‘Bambi’ and lead the life she longed for on the music-hall stages. Jean-Pierre, known since then as Marie-Pierre, is now 77 years old. Hers is a story of deep-seated confusion, painful rejection and impassioned courage. An impressive collage of photographs and chansons, archive footage, excerpts from feature films, Super-8 clips and visits to the places of her childhood provides a sensitive chronicle of her liberating transformation into a radiant transsexual woman. Stops along the way include her first love, her friendship with fellow artiste Coccinelle, her experiments with hormones, her rivals and scandals, the story of how she became a writer – and her surprising encounter with the love of her life.