L’Empreinte de l’Ange is due to be released in the UK on May 22nd this year, but it was shown on 16th March as part of Bradford International Film Festival’s programme of Premieres and Previews.
Billed as ‘one of the coming year’s outstanding French dramas’, the film features outstanding performances from Catherine Frot (The Page Turner, 2006), and Sandrine Bonnaire as two mothers brought together by their love for a single child.
When Elsa (Frot) goes to collect her son from a birthday party, she is stopped in her tracks at the sight of a seven year old girl, Lola. She knows instantly that this child is her daughter, a daughter who died at three days old in a maternity unit fire. How can that be? Elsa’s maternal instinct is stronger than her powers of logic and reason, and so here begins her obsession. She must find out more – where does this child live? Who are her parents? More importantly, how can she get her daughter back?
Elsa’s son and Lola’s brother are friends so Elsa engineers opportunities for the children to play together in order that she can be near Lola. Lola’s mother, Claire (Bonnaire), soon becomes suspicious of Elsa’s attraction to her daughter. As Elsa’s behaviour becomes more irrational and she turns up everywhere they go, Claire decides to confront her. Calmly, Elsa accuses her of stealing her daughter and demands a DNA test to prove it.
It all sounds very far fetched and melodramatic, but it isn’t. Seven years on from losing a child, Elsa is just beginning to get her life back together after an extended period of depression, when she sees Lola. Although she knows it can’t be real, her daughter is dead, she cannot shrug off the possibility that what she has believed for seven years may not be true. What affected me watching this film was how quickly a rational person can become quite the opposite, ignoring and neglecting their own family, lying and manipulating others to get what they want. The speed of movement from one state to the other is quite terrifying. And, what if Elsa somehow turns out to be correct? What if she’s not crazy? How should we feel about her behaviour then?
What makes this film so absorbing as a thriller is its realism. The camerawork is subtle; it doesn’t distract you from the story. Neither does the dialogue which most of the time is downright mundane – mostly made up of small talk and pleasantries. A story like this doesn’t need soliloquys or breathtaking cinematography because it’s about people and to convey that, all you need is good acting. Frot and Bonnaire deliver just that, accompanied only by the requisite melancholy cello music that comes with all French thrillers.
This is one of those films that makes you think for a long time after you’ve left the cinema. Set around two normal families whose lives revolve around ferrying their children from one activity to another, this film shows that with just one chance meeting, previously ordered lives can be thrown into turmoil and secrets you thought were long buried can instantly resurface. If you have secrets you thought you’d got away with, this film could make you feel very uncomfortable indeed.