Beasts (film)

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Movie
German title Beasts
(alternative title: Bloody Angel)
Original title La cérémonie
Country of production Germany , France
original language French
Publishing year 1995
length 111 minutes
Age rating FSK 12
Rod
Director Claude Chabrol
script Claude Chabrol,
Caroline Eliacheff
production Marin Karmitz ,
Christoph Holch,
Ira von Gienanth
music Matthieu Chabrol
camera Bernard Zitzermann
cut Monique Fardoulis
occupation

Biester (Original title: La cérémonie ) is a French feature film by Claude Chabrol from 1995. It is based on the novel A Judgment in Stone by Ruth Rendell . The film was shot in 1994/95 in the Ille-et-Vilaine department .

action

Sophie is a very quiet and almost obsequiously modest employee in the household of the rich and distinguished Lelievre family. She knows how to hide her illiteracy with new excuses. When she is supposed to make a purchase by phone, she goes into town with the list and asks the postal worker Jeanne to place the order because their phone is broken. Jeanne immediately asks her about her employers.

One day Jeanne rings Sophie's doorbell to deliver the mail and starts to tour the family home. The quiet Sophie lets the dynamic Jeanne do it, although Jeanne intrudes into private rooms and even looks through Madame's wardrobe and then simply takes a book with her from the library. From Jeanne's negative comments it becomes clear that she envies the wealthy family for their home and money and Madame Lelievre for their status. So she tells Sophie that she still knew Catherine Lelievre when they both worked as a model. Sophie believes Jeanne's stories, they both become friends and spend more and more time together. Jeanne warns Sophie not to simply accept the bourgeois exploitation of her labor by the arrogant Lelievres and to calmly defend herself against work orders.

When both celebrate Sophie's birthday together, Sophie speaks to Jeanne about the death of her daughter. In a conversation between the Lelievres, she heard that Jeanne is said to have mistreated her four-year-old daughter so badly that she died. Jeanne says that nothing could be proven to her and describes the act as an unfortunate mistake. Then she shows Sophie a newspaper article with her picture. This article reports on a house fire in which a wheelchair-bound pensioner died, but his suspected daughter was acquitted for lack of evidence. Sophie admits the house was her parents' home. When Jeanne asks if it was her, she laughs and says that nothing could be proven to her.

Georges Lelievre, who has long suspected that Jeanne was spying on the family, one day complained to her that, since she was running the post office, all letters had arrived open. The argument between the two of them escalates, Georges Lelievre slaps Jeanne and leaves the post office angrily. Since the friendship between Sophie and Jeanne was a thorn in his side anyway, he tells Sophie that Jeanne is no longer allowed to visit her in his house. Jeanne is angry about the ban and tells Sophie to try to find out more about the family.

Sophie overhears a phone call between the daughter of the house and her boyfriend, in which Melinda confesses to her boyfriend that he is pregnant. In her troubled state, Melinda invites Sophie to have tea with her. Melinda finds out that Sophie cannot read, but promises her to help and not to reveal anything. Horrified by this exposure, Sophie Melinda threatens to reveal her pregnancy to her parents if she should reveal her illiteracy.

When Melinda's parents come home to find Melinda crying, the pregnancy and Sophie's problem come out. Angry about Sophie's blackmail attempt, Georges Lelievre quits her and gives her a week to leave his house.

Later, Sophie and Jeanne meet in Jeanne's apartment. When Jeanne found out about the dismissal, she offered Sophie to live with her until she found a new job. The two then set out to get Sophie's things. Despite the prohibition and Sophie's warning, Jeanne enters the house. The whole family sits together in the living room to watch the opera Don Giovanni by Mozart and to record the music on the television using a microphone. Nobody notices Sophie and Jeanne. When the two of them make a hot chocolate and then pack Sophie's clothes, Jeanne goes into the Lelievre's bedroom and begins to riot there. Encouraged by this, Sophie also begins to tear the clothes of her employers. After the bedroom is destroyed, they both go back to the kitchen and play around with hunting rifles. At that moment, alerted by noise, Georges Lelievre enters the kitchen. When he tries to take the rifle from Jeanne to have them both out of the house, Sophie shoots him. Unmoved, both women enter the living room and shoot the whole family in quick succession.

Sophie and Jeanne agree that Sophie should call the police and testify that she found the dead like this on their return. Jeanne goes to her car while Sophie "cleans up" the crime scene. When turning on the country road, Jeanne chokes the engine of her old Citroën 2CV , at that moment she is rammed by another car and dies in the accident. When Sophie has finished "cleaning up" in the Lelievre's house, she runs to the street to go to the police in the next town. From a distance, she observes the hearse that is taking away Jeanne's body and sees a police officer examining Jeanne's car. In the back seat of the car is the recorder that Jeanne stole from the Lelievres' living room and was used to record the opera. A policeman presses the play button and the opera resounds through the night, interrupted by a series of shots and Jeanne's voice.

Awards

  • In 1996 Isabelle Huppert won the César for Best Actress. The film was nominated in the categories of Best Film and Best Director (Claude Chabrol) and Best Actress for Sandrine Bonnaire, Best Supporting Actor (Jean-Pierre Cassel), Best Supporting Actress (Jacqueline Bisset) and Best Adaptation (Caroline Eliacheff and Claude Chabrol).
  • In the same year Biester won the LAFCA (Los Angeles Film Critics Association) award for best foreign film and Isabelle Huppert won the Lumiere award for best actress in France.
  • In 1997 Biester won the NSFC (National Society of Film Critics) Award for best foreign film. He also received the Metro Media Award from the Toronto International Film Festival.

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