Description
Russian premiere
September 1940. Henri Marre arrives alone in Vichy as the authoritarian regime settles in. Broke, estranged from his family, and carrying copies of his self-published manifesto Notre Salut (Our Salvation), the 49-year-old is determined to secure what he believes is his rightful place in the new administration. In his writing, Henri sets out his patriotic convictions and his engineer’s methodology: efficiency above all. Claiming he wants to help save France after defeat, he does whatever is required to remain useful, serving the machinery of the new order with increasing skill. But he may be pursuing something more urgent: escape from his own ruin.
About the director:
Emmanuel Marre
Director and screenwriter. Born in France in 1980. He studied literature, worked at several jobs, then moved to Belgium and trained at the Institut des Arts de Diffusion (IAD). He has made documentary and fiction shorts; The Summer Movie (2016) won the Grand Prix of the national competition at the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival. The documentary Castle to Castle (2018), made in collaboration with Julie Lecoustre, won the short-film programme at Locarno; their first fiction feature, Zero F* Given (2021), received the Award for Distribution at Cannes Critics’ Week, the main prize at the Gijón IFF, and other awards.