L'empreinte de l'ange (2008)

User Rating:

6.8/10   

Director:

Safy Nebbou

Writers:

Cyril Gomez-Mathieu (writer)
Safy Nebbou (writer)

Release Date:

13 August 2008 (Belgium)

Genre:

Drama

Plot Keywords:

Cafe | Instinct | Harassment | Family Relationships | Dead Daughter

Cast

Catherine Frot	...	Elsa Valentin
Sandrine Bonnaire	...	Claire Vigneaux
Wladimir Yordanoff	...	Bernard Vigneaux
Antoine Chappey	...	Antoine
Michel Aumont	...	Alain Valentin
Michèle Moretti	...	Colette
Sophie Quinton	...	Laurence
Geneviève Rey-Penchenat	...	Mme Corlet
Héloïse Cunin	...	Lola
Arthur Vaughan-Whitehead	...	Thomas
Zacharie Chasseriaud	...	Jérémy
Jérémie Nebbou	...	Le policier
Marie-Julie Baup	...	L'infirmière
Pascal Elso	...	L'homme du bar
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Safy Nebbou	...	Le client de la pharmacie
Isabelle Siou

Also Known As:

Mark of an Angel (International: English title)

Runtime:

95 min

Country:

France

Language:

French

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Switzerland:14 (canton of Vaud) | Switzerland:14 (canton of Geneva) | France:U | Netherlands:12

Company:

Diaphana Films

Implausible?

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

I thought this was a great film, totally compelling, with fine acting. In answer to the implausibility of the plot (based on true events) I would say that a mother can have a sixth sense about her offspring. Some people are much more visually aware than others and I think it's therefore possible to have an idea of what someone would look like years later. Besides there may well be photographs and memories of what close relatives looked like at a similar age which would heighten that sense of recognition. As for Sandrine Bonnaire not recognising Catherine Frot as the woman she presumed dead lying on the floor of the hospital, we don't know if they had much, if anything, to do with each other in the hospital and, panic-stricken as she was after realising that her own child had perished and in the midst of an inferno, it's perfectly plausible that she did not remember her. This is a film which will stay with me for some time and I'd thoroughly recommend it.