Les Innocentes (2016)
Directed by Anne Fontaine

Film Review

For her second foray into period drama (the first being Coco avant Chanel), director Anne Fontaine takes her inspiration from a true story, the rape of 25 nuns at a convent in Poland by Red Army soldiers at the end of the Second World War.  It's an unusual departure for a filmmaker who has so far divided her time fairly evenly between dark psychological dramas (Nettoyage à sec, Entre ses mains) and whimsical comedies (Augustin, roi du kung-fu, Mon pire cauchemar).  Les Innocentes is more of a traditional character piece, one that compares how women of very different beliefs, experiences and temperament deal with the same human tragedy and regain their trust in humanity and/or the Almighty.  It is sombre, contemplative film that boasts some strong performances and impressive production design, but an unfocused and uneven script prevents it from having as much emotional impact as it should.

On the acting front, Lou de Laâge makes the greatest impression as the sympathetic Red Cross nurse who has not only the pregnant nuns' physical welfare to attend to but also their spiritual and psychological concerns.  It was for this performance, her first leading role in a film, that she was awarded the Prix Romy-Schneider in 2016.  Of the holy sisters, only Agata Buzek stands out - the rest have so little to distinguish them that they merge into a kind of Gestalt entity and have no individual presence.  Agata Kulesza's stubborn mother superior is painfully two dimensional and is hard to take seriously.  A romantic subplot involving Laâge's character and a doctor played by Vincent Macaigne is underdeveloped to the point of being inconsequential and is just one of several futile distractions from the main narrative strand that weaken the film's overall impact.

Les Innocentes's overriding Achilles heel is a clunky script that, presumably owing to having so many contributors (five in total), lacks coherence and sustained dramatic impact.  Much of the dialogue is overwritten and, sparse though it is, much of it seems superfluous.  Fontaine ought to have had more confidence in her visuals and her actors to prune some of  the excess verbiage - if she had done this the film would undoubtedly have had both greater clarity and more of an emotional resonance.  As it is, Les Innocentes feels overladen with redundant content and struggles to gel into a satisfying whole. Fontaine's over-formal direction, whilst it has a certain appealing elegance, merely adds to the film's stiffness. Ultimately, it is the captivating contributions from Buzek and Laâge, two remarkable actresses, that save the film and endow it with the humanity that Fontaine and her writing team struggle to supply.

Film Synopsis

In December 1945, Mathilde Beaulieu is a young nurse at a makeshift hospital of the French Red Cross in Poland.  The hospital's purpose is to treat fugitives from France before they can be returned to their home country.  One day, a visibly distressed nun shows up and implores Mathilde to help her.  Even though she is only supposed to treat French nationals, Mathilde allows her compassion and curiosity to get the better of her.  The nun takes her to a remote convent inhabited by her Benedictine sisters where a monstrous crime has been committed.  Several months previously, a squad of Red Army soldiers raided the convent and raped several nuns, with the result that now seven of them are pregnant and near the end of their term.  Desperately ill-equipped to deal with the situation, the nuns need Mathilde's help, but the mother superior refuses to engage a midwife through fear that this will bring disgrace upon her order.  For some of the nuns, this present crisis risks destroying their faith altogether.  If there is a God, how could he let this calamity happen to them?  Despite the fact she is an atheist, Mathilde is moved by the plight of the sisters and feels she has no choice but to help in their hour of greatest need...