Mélanie Thierry, Josiane Balasko, Marina Foïs, Carole Bouquet and Yolande Moreau in a new “bal des fous” at Salpêtrière

Arnaud des Pallières’ film is an insight into the Pitié-Salpêtrière asylum in the 19th century, where women deemed “crazy”, prostitutes, or still the rebels and the strong heads.

Three years after Mélanie Laurent’s excellent adaptation of the novel The Fools’ Ball by Victoria Mas, still available on Amazon Prime, here we are plunged back into the ordeal of the women locked up in the 19th century in the psychiatric wards of the Pitié-Salpêtrière hospital in Paris. Captivesdirected by Arnaud des Pallières, this time from an original screenplay, can be seen in theaters from January 24.

Fanni, a young bourgeois woman, abandons her husband and children to voluntarily allow herself to be locked up within the walls of Pitié-Salpêtrière. She is looking for her mother, who she thinks was interned there several years ago. The young woman discovers with amazement the violence to which the women locked up in this asylum are victims, either because they suffer from psychiatric disorders, disabilities, nervous illnesses, or are sane, but imprisoned under duress by a husband or a family who wants to get rid of it.

The young woman undergoes the same treatment as her peers, while embarking on her investigation. An approach which does not improve his living conditions in the asylum. She gradually builds relationships with some of them and intends to get out of there when she finds her mother. But while the annual ball is being prepared, she finds herself trapped in a prison world from which it is very difficult to escape…

Out of the world

In project before the release of Victoria Mas’ book, Captives is constructed like a thriller, with a plot around Fanni’s search for his mother. This bias keeps us in suspense during the first part of the film, the production of which, with numerous close shots on faces, filmed almost like landscapes in often harsh light, camera movements which give the impression of images stolen, conveys well the stifling atmosphere and the violence of the place.

The main character offers us an overview of this prison universe where the vices of the jailers, the madness of the “patients” and the violence of a system outside the world and beyond the law, with its own rules, its little arrangements are unleashed. , its perverse links with the good outside world.

The film is served by a top-flight female cast. Mélanie Thierry, very convincing, is surrounded by Josiane Balasko and Marina Foïs in the roles of characters unleashed with wickedness, Carole Bouquet is perfect as a sequestered and rebellious diva, Yolande Moreau, very inspired in her role as a sweet and lost old lady, and the Secondary characters, like the old prostitute played by Dominique Frot, are no less invested.

Despite this team of actresses playing their part to the best of their ability, the film quickly loses intensity, getting bogged down in a script that doesn’t seem to know where it’s going, and in repetitive staging, which ends up becoming heavy. To describe the same world, Mélanie Laurent was able to offer an adaptation of Victoria Mas’ novel tinged with a saving exuberance and a sobriety in pathos, which better suited a subject with no need for overkill.

The film nevertheless has the merit of opening a new window on this dark part of the history of Salpêtrière, of medicine, of brutal morals towards women, and of practices of abuse of weakness and mistreatment towards of those suffering from mental disorders.

The sheet

Gender : Drama, Historical, Thriller
Director: Arnaud des Pallières
Actors: Mélanie Thierry, Josiane Balasko, Marina Foïs, Carole Bouquet
Country : France
Duration : 1h 50min
Exit : 24 January 2024
Distributer : Wild Bunch Cast

Synopsis : Paris, 1894. Who is Fanni who claims to have voluntarily allowed herself to be locked up in the Salpêtrière Hospital? Looking for her mother among the multitude of women convinced of “madness”, Fanni discovers a reality of the asylum quite different from what she imagined, as well as the unexpected friendship of companions in misfortune. The last big ball at Salpêtrière is getting ready. Politicians, artists and socialites will flock there. Last hope of escaping the trap that is closing…