A woman thing

Movie
German title	A woman thing
Original title	Une affaire de femme
Country of production	France
original language	French
Publishing year	1988
length	108 minutes
Age rating	FSK 16
Rod
Director	Claude Chabrol
script	Colo Tavernier ; Claude Chabrol ; Francis Szpiner (novel)
production	Marin Karmitz
music	Matthieu Chabrol
camera	Jean Rabier
cut	Monique Fardoulis
occupation
	Isabelle Huppert : Marie Latour; François Cluzet : Paul; Nils Tavernier : Lucien; Marie Trintignant : Lulu; Lolita Chammah : Mouche 2; Aurore Gavin : Mouche 1; Guillaume Foutrier : Pierrot 1; Nicolas Foutrier : Pierrot 2; Marie Bunel : Ginette; Dominique Blanc : Jasmine; Evelyne Didi : Fernande; Dani : Loulou; François Maistre : Lamarre-Coudray;

A Woman's Thing is a French film by Claude Chabrol from 1988 based on a book by Francis Szpiner.

action

During the German occupation of France, many French men were held prisoners of war. Out of necessity, many French women enter into a relationship with German soldiers, which often results in a child. Marie Latour, who has two children herself, first performs illegal abortions as an angel maker for the neighbor and then for other young women . With this, Marie significantly improves the income of her own family; it allows her some luxuries that other families do not have.

Her husband is returning from Germany unfit for work due to an injury. Marie rejects his advances because she no longer loves him. She meets the prostitute Lucy alias Lulu and lets her the children's room in her apartment by the hour for a fee. Her husband asks her several times where she gets the money from, but she doesn't speak to him.

Once a woman dies after seeing Marie for treatment, causing her husband to commit suicide. Marie is not aware of any guilt and continues to perform abortions. When she got rich, she bought a housekeeper and took singing lessons; her dream is to become a singer one day.

She is attracted to one of Lulu's customers, and he likes her too. She takes him as a lover. One day her husband comes home from work and finds Lulu sleeping on the sofa and Marie and her lover in bed. After Marie hadn't spoken to him before and hadn't given him any more answers, he said nothing, but was deeply hurt.

He writes an anonymous letter to the local inspector informing him that his wife has performed more than ten abortions and is renting rooms to a prostitute. Then Marie is arrested. The matter is hyped and Marie is transferred to a prison in Paris.

Your lawyer has limited optimism. Nobody expects a woman to be sentenced to death. But the state court, where crimes against the people are usually tried, makes an example under the Vichy regime and decides on the death penalty for having carried out abortions in 23 cases; a petition for clemency is also rejected. The film ends with the fall of the guillotine and the faded-in request to have pity on the children of those who are convicted.

background

The film is based on a true story: on July 30, 1943, Marie-Louise Giraud was executed by Jules-Henri Desfourneaux for carrying out abortions in La Roquette prison in Paris , after she had been proven in an extraordinary court that she was on 26 Women in the Cherbourg area had performed abortions. On June 8, she was sentenced to death by the guillotine . The law on this was tightened on February 15, 1942 by the Vichy regime , as previously only a one to five year prison sentence was imposed on unauthorized abortion. This law was repealed after the liberation of France.

After the premiere in France, Claude Chabrol received massive tear gas attacks and even death threats for making blasphemous statements . So Marie says before her execution: "Ave Maria, damn your body, which only contains shit [...]."

Reviews

The television magazine prisma says of the film that Claude Chabrol describes “a dark chapter in French history in this remarkable and brilliantly played drama”, and continues: “Even if the Catholic criticism in particular rejects this work, it counts as one the last really good films by Chabrol. ”With this she refers to the comment in the lexicon of international film , according to which Chabrol's“ routinely staged film instead of a psychologically founded moral study merely drafts a deeply disappointing document ”. Furthermore, the director is accused of “one-sided cynical indifference and misunderstood, 'compassionate' liberality”.

Spiegel No. 4/1989 praises Isabelle Huppert's portrayal of Marie as “flirtatious and powerful, naive and calculating, unmoved and untouchable” and comes to the conclusion that the coldness of the film “does not allow any identification with the characters who did what happened always played down ". But Chabrol's perfection is also disturbing, “because it appears to be unchangeable about what was (and is). The moralist likes to wear the mask of the executioner. "

The lexicon of international film published by the Catholic Film Commission judges against it:

"Instead of a psychologically well-founded moral study, Chabrol's routinely staged film merely drafts a deeply disappointing document: It describes the important ethical-moral conflict with an overall one-sided cynical indifference and misunderstood," compassionate "liberality."

literature

Frieda Grafe: Susanne in the mustard bath . First published in: Süddeutsche Zeitung on January 26, 1989; in: Writings, Volume 3 . Brinkmann & Bose Verlag, Berlin 2003. ISBN 3-922660-82-7 . Pp. 131-133.