Humanité (L')

English title: Humanity
Genre: psychological drama
Director: Bruno Dumont
Release: 2000
Studio: Arte France Cinéma et al. - Winstar Cinema
Rating: -
MBiS score: 8.7/10


Bless The Beasts And The Children


In a small French town near the English Channel, police lieutenant Pharaon de Winter (Emmanuel Schotté) and his colleagues from the force are called upon to investigate the grisly rape and murder of an eleven-year-old girl. For Pharaon, this professional ordeal adds to a more personal drama, his repressed feelings of love for Domino (Séverine Caneele), who already entertains a relationship with Joseph (Philippe Tullier), one of his friends. With Ginette Allegre (Éliane, Pharaon’s mother) and Ghislain Ghesquière (the chief of police).

Once in a while, you come across a movie so distant from the mainstream that it almost defies analysis. Such is the case for L’HUMANITÉ, an abstract feature that raises several questions without limiting itself to one specific set of answers. To better appreciate this difficult film, you should focus more on the characters’ actions than their final destination because the script offers no definitive statement that ties together each and every element of the story. It is in this sense that Bruno Dumont’s film stands as a genuine challenge: long after seeing it, you will find yourself reviewing its strong images in your mind and reflecting on its themes and psychology, a reaction often elicited by true works of art.

Through Pharaon, L’HUMANITÉ illustrates man’s travails on Earth, his inner struggles, his desperate attempts to make sense of his life and that of others. Like a mirror that mercilessly reveals warts as well as beauty, it forces us to acknowledge our capacity for evil, our weakness and our brutality. Dumont achieved this by using lingering takes, symbolism and quasi-religious introspection but, if his meditative process seems a bit slow and deliberate, it is by no means boring; it simply conveys the profound malaise felt by his characters in the barren expanses of their native countryside. What affected me most was Pharaon’s introversion and acute sense of compassion. Was this man cut out to be a cop? I will let you decide on your own.

L’HUMANITÉ will not please everyone – especially not action fans – but, if enigmatic, psychology-driven movies are your cup of tea, then this art house gem will strike you as a potent, audacious and thought-provoking work about one man’s dilemma and the human condition in general. To watch this film is to experience transcendence.


MBiS

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