The Chamber of Wonders | Mother courage

After her son’s accident, Thelma decides to carry out for him the “10 things to do before the end of the world” that he had written in his diary. This is the challenge of a mother ready to do anything to help her teenager wake up from a coma.

There are films that we admire because they renew the cinematographic language with genius. And there are others who, without revolutionizing the 7^e art, find a place in our hearts. The room of wonders belongs to the latter category. Lisa Azuelos has created a deeply humane feature film. A modern fable with a heroine with a “winding life, filled with failures and scars”.

Thelma (terrific Alexandra Lamy) is a single mother who raises Louis alone and works in a warehouse. The day his son falls into a coma after a car accident skateboard, Thelma will lose her reason for living. In her son’s room, she discovers his diary illustrated with manga. She also finds her list of “10 things to do before the end of the world… which may happen faster than expected”. From then on, she sets off on an adventure around the world to make her son’s dreams come true, one by one. And maybe wake his son from a coma by making his wishes come true. These are diverse: have your skateboard by a manga illustrator who lives as a recluse in Tokyo, meeting his father whom he never knew, swimming with whales in the sea.

Director Lisa Azuelos creates an ode to kindness, a modern tale about resilience. Adapted from the novel of the same name by Julien Sandrel, the film is made in a fairly classic way, even a little conventional, but with great sensitivity. In the role of this courageous, stubborn and endearing mother, Alexandra Lamy is perfect! The actressA boy a girl in France excels as much in comedy as in drama and fantasy.

Of course, we are far from a masterpiece, but sometimes, cinema also serves to do useful work by offering stories that make us believe in human goodness and solidarity. With the help of her mother (Muriel Robin) and a young neighbor (Xavier Lacaille), Thelma, out of maternal love, will keep her head above water. And conquer your fears by discovering “that no adult ambition can make you happier than an adolescent carpe diem”.

Drama

The room of wonders

Lisa Azuelos

With Alexandra Lamy, Muriel Robin, Xavier Lacaille

1:37 a.m.
Indoors

7/10