The Five Devils (2022)
(Les cinq diables)
Country: FR
Technical: col/2.39:1 103m
Director: Léa Mysius
Cast: Adèle Exarchopoulos, Swala Emati, Sally Dramé, Moustapha Mbengue
Synopsis:
The daughter of a hydrotherapist in a small Alpine town displays extraordinary olfactory powers, but before the latter has chance to seek professional advice they are put to uncanny use when the girl's aunt - and mother's former lover - drops in for an impromptu stay. The girl senses a competitor, both for her mother's affections and her own powers of sorcery, and proceeds to investigate their common past via sensory invocation. Dad, a fireman, is understandably all at sea.
Review:
This directorial début, part love story, part child's rite of passage, part horror, unfolds less like a traditional slice of French than a Scandi-noir, with its travelling drone shots of the lake and mountains, and out-of-body flashbacks with Lynchian lurches of terror. It manages to immerse you in its world with considerable skill and the star is like a pressure cooker of emotion waiting to explode; her initial hostility towards an old flame is perhaps harder to reconcile.
(Les cinq diables)
Country: FR
Technical: col/2.39:1 103m
Director: Léa Mysius
Cast: Adèle Exarchopoulos, Swala Emati, Sally Dramé, Moustapha Mbengue
Synopsis:
The daughter of a hydrotherapist in a small Alpine town displays extraordinary olfactory powers, but before the latter has chance to seek professional advice they are put to uncanny use when the girl's aunt - and mother's former lover - drops in for an impromptu stay. The girl senses a competitor, both for her mother's affections and her own powers of sorcery, and proceeds to investigate their common past via sensory invocation. Dad, a fireman, is understandably all at sea.
Review:
This directorial début, part love story, part child's rite of passage, part horror, unfolds less like a traditional slice of French than a Scandi-noir, with its travelling drone shots of the lake and mountains, and out-of-body flashbacks with Lynchian lurches of terror. It manages to immerse you in its world with considerable skill and the star is like a pressure cooker of emotion waiting to explode; her initial hostility towards an old flame is perhaps harder to reconcile.
(Les cinq diables)
Country: FR
Technical: col/2.39:1 103m
Director: Léa Mysius
Cast: Adèle Exarchopoulos, Swala Emati, Sally Dramé, Moustapha Mbengue
Synopsis:
The daughter of a hydrotherapist in a small Alpine town displays extraordinary olfactory powers, but before the latter has chance to seek professional advice they are put to uncanny use when the girl's aunt - and mother's former lover - drops in for an impromptu stay. The girl senses a competitor, both for her mother's affections and her own powers of sorcery, and proceeds to investigate their common past via sensory invocation. Dad, a fireman, is understandably all at sea.
Review:
This directorial début, part love story, part child's rite of passage, part horror, unfolds less like a traditional slice of French than a Scandi-noir, with its travelling drone shots of the lake and mountains, and out-of-body flashbacks with Lynchian lurches of terror. It manages to immerse you in its world with considerable skill and the star is like a pressure cooker of emotion waiting to explode; her initial hostility towards an old flame is perhaps harder to reconcile.