Saint Omer

Saint Omer

2DCS15
Director:Alice Diop
Cast:Kayije Kagame, Guslagie Malanda, Aurélia Petit, Xavier Maly
Premiere:8. October 2023
Length:122 minutes
Genre:Drama

Director: Alice Diop  •  Cast: Kayije Kagame, Guslagie Malanda, Aurélia Petit, Xavier Maly, Thomas de Pourquery, Valérie Dréville

In this extraordinary narrative by acclaimed documentary filmmaker Alice Diop, a young writer confronts her personal traumas as she watches the trial of a woman accused of killing her own child. For ten years, award-winning documentary filmmaker Alice Diop has focused her camera's eye on injustice and the personal stories of various immigrant communities in the Parisian periphery. In her stunning feature film debut, the director tells, with her typical sensitivity and intensity, a story loosely adapted from a report published in 2013 in Black Chronicle. At the time, a young woman reportedly abandoned her 15-month-old daughter on a beach in northern France as the tide was starting to rise, leaving her to her fate. This progressively more claustrophobic courtroom drama is narrated with stoic insight by Rama (played with restrained intensity by the excellent Kayije Kagame), a young writer working on a contemporary retelling of the ancient myth of Medea. Rama is pregnant herself, and her initial unease, dismal family history, doubts and fears about motherhood gradually fade as the life story of the accused Laurence Cola (played by the exceptional Guslagie Malanda) is revealed. Her experiences - beginning with her harsh childhood in Senegal and ending with her gradual alienation from her family and society after arriving in Europe - evoke traumas of racism and emotional manipulation that, while they may remain unspoken, can still destroy us insidiously and irrevocably.

Length: 122 min

Year: 2023
Local premiere date: 8. October 2023

Country of origin:

  • France

Director: Alice Diop  •  Cast: Kayije Kagame, Guslagie Malanda, Aurélia Petit, Xavier Maly, Thomas de Pourquery, Valérie Dréville

In this extraordinary narrative by acclaimed documentary filmmaker Alice Diop, a young writer confronts her personal traumas as she watches the trial of a woman accused of killing her own child. For ten years, award-winning documentary filmmaker Alice Diop has focused her camera's eye on injustice and the personal stories of various immigrant communities in the Parisian periphery. In her stunning feature film debut, the director tells, with her typical sensitivity and intensity, a story loosely adapted from a report published in 2013 in Black Chronicle. At the time, a young woman reportedly abandoned her 15-month-old daughter on a beach in northern France as the tide was starting to rise, leaving her to her fate. This progressively more claustrophobic courtroom drama is narrated with stoic insight by Rama (played with restrained intensity by the excellent Kayije Kagame), a young writer working on a contemporary retelling of the ancient myth of Medea. Rama is pregnant herself, and her initial unease, dismal family history, doubts and fears about motherhood gradually fade as the life story of the accused Laurence Cola (played by the exceptional Guslagie Malanda) is revealed. Her experiences - beginning with her harsh childhood in Senegal and ending with her gradual alienation from her family and society after arriving in Europe - evoke traumas of racism and emotional manipulation that, while they may remain unspoken, can still destroy us insidiously and irrevocably.

Year: 2023
Local premiere date: 8. October 2023

Country of origin:

  • France