The critical gaze of Vittorio De Agrò from the Palais

(by Cannes Luigi Noira and Vittorio De Agrò (RS) with the kind collaboration of Eleonora Ono – the photos are published courtesy of the Cannes Film Festival)

On the third day of the Terry Fremaux Festival confirms the attention to the social with two films to be rewarded

COMPETITION

Dossier 137 Dominik Moll

A work that fits consistently in the European debate on institutional violence and that invites us to reflect on those who really pay the price of truth

Plot: Stephanie is an expert investigator of the IGPN, the organ that controls the conduct of the police. When, during an event, A young protester is seriously injured by an explosive ball shot by an agent, Stéphanie is entrusted with the task of reconstructing the incident and identifying the managers. What at the beginning seems like a case like many, Ranked with the number 137, It soon turns into something personal. An insignificant detail awakens in her memories linked to her origins. The dossier is no longer a file, but an open wound, A moral challenge that shakes its role, his ethics, and his idea of ​​justice.

Review: Dossier 137 he tackles a very current theme: Police violence, the power of the state and the contradictions of the judicial system. Moll chooses to tell these events not from the point of view of the victims, but from that of those who are called to investigate their colleagues. An internal perspective, ambiguous, emotionally engaging.

The film is inspired by facts that really happened: December 8th 2018, During an event of the yellow vests in Paris, a boy of 20 years was hit in the head by a bullet shot by an agent of a special unit. The episode raised strong controversies, pushed to the opening of an internal investigation and became a symbol of a system of impunity.

Stéphanie has been doing this job for twenty years: question, reconstruct, establish responsibilities. With rigor and honesty. But this time something changes. The struck boy comes from the same village in which he was born. The investigation becomes an inner journey even, which pushes the protagonist to question its neutrality.

The first part of the film is built on a sequence of cold interrogations, bureaucratic, which return well the reticence and compactness of the police force. Colleagues are covered, they protect themselves, refuse all responsibility. The rhythm is deliberately compassionate, almost aseptic. It could be distant, But to support everything is the magnetic presence of Léa Drucker: tense, firm posture, ability to transmit doubts, pain, decision without ever raising the voice. His face is a penalty mask that crashes slowly.

The turning point comes with the discovery of a decisive video. Stéphanie Cambia Posture, it becomes more determined. The film turns from the legal drama to the ethical thriller: What happens when the truth contrasts with institutional interests?

The end, bitter and realistic, leaves little room for hope. Despite the tests, images, The testimonies, The truth is not enough. Too many quibbles, too much bureaucracy, too much fear. And so, as it often happens, do not pay the culprits but who has had the courage to seek justice. Stéphanie is accused by alleged negligence. A scapegoat, sacrificed in the name of the reason of state.

Conclusion

Dossier 137 It is a necessary film, sober, strict. Never gives up to rhetoric or emphasis, But it builds a tense and credible story about the control system and its cracks. Dominik Moll chooses a dry direction, never please, and focuses everything on the narrative force of the looks, of silences, of doubts.

A work that fits consistently in the European debate on institutional violence and that invites us to reflect on those who really pay the price of truth.

Syrup di oliver laxe

A film that talks about fathers and children, of escapes and returns

Plot: After the disappearance of his daughter during a rave in Morocco, Luis (Sergi López), A man with a opaque past and rigid ways, He starts with his son Esteban in his search. For months they have not had his news. Following vague tracks, they find themselves living in the car, chasing the caravans of the raves. But what begins as a journey to find Mar, It soon turns into something more complex, perhaps even more dangerous.

Review: The film opens in the middle of a rave in the desert. Bassline shot, blurred faces, ball music. A scene that seems to have not started or end. In this visual and sound magma, Luis and his son move. Show the photo of Mar, ask around. The overrote is long, almost hypnotic. Laxe throws us inside without compass. And it works.

Let's find out that Luis and Esteban sleep in the car with the dog. MAR has been looking for MAR for months. Follow the rave movement from one gathering to another. Apparently, Nothing further than a bourgeois and disillusioned father and these guys who live to dance into thin air. But Sirat manages to keep two worlds together that touch each other with diffidence, without forcing.

Music ends sharply when the military arrives. Order of eviction. Scenes that recall many other clashes in the square, only here we are in the middle of the desert. Two buses do not stop and run away. Esteban convinces Luis to follow them with their utility car. Thus begins an absurd journey, dusty, full of deviations and meetings, Inside a caravan that is not only nomadic, but also ideological.

In this first part, Laxe makes us enter the group. Small gestures, smozzicate dialogues, silences. Let's find out that Mar has not been kidnapped. He went away. Has chosen. Perhaps to get away from a too severe father, maybe to breathe. Sergi López holds the film with an internal acting, dry, but never empty.

Then the film changes. Suddenly. The second rave is not there. The place is deserted, literally. Instead of the coffers: launchers. Sirat becomes another thing. A film about illusion? On the error? On death? We don't know it well, And maybe it doesn't matter. Some characters disappear, others die. The caravan flashed. The desert swallows them. The viewer struggles to find the thread, But it's the same journey as Luis: without coordinates.

The last turning point arrives with a minibus of migrants. Luis and the other survivors are loaded on board. We pass from those who flee by choice (i ravers) to those who flee to survive. The border is thin, but real.

Conclusion

Sirat is not a movie for everyone. It is slow, At times disorienting, deliberately incomplete. But it has something sincere, visceral. It doesn't tell you what to think, throws you inside. It's up to you to decide whether to follow it or leave it there.

A film that talks about fathers and children, of escapes and returns, but also of those ephemeral communities that are built out of everything. Maybe even for one night just, with music in the veins and no guaranteed tomorrow.

Vittorio De Agrò (RS)