It is the story of a revolution in female intimacy in the face of a patriarchy that stifles society. Marseille, 46 degrees. The planet is suffocating and so are the hearts of Élise (Noémie Merlant), Ruby (Souheila Yacoub) and Nicole (Sanda Codreanu), the three main characters. Together, they live in shared accommodation. Élise is an actress in a rocky relationship with a lawyer, Ruby is a camgirl, and Nicole is an aspiring writer. The neighbor across the street, Magnani (Lucas Bravo), is the subject of his fantasies and his attempts at writing. One evening, the three young women accept the latter's invitation to spend a drunken evening in his company, at his home. From then on, everything changes. The dream turns into a nightmare.
With Women on the balcony, Noémie Merlant signs an absolutely remarkable and explosive second feature film. The slightly Tarantino-esque first five minutes immediately set the tone. Denise (Nadège Beausson-Diagne), the neighbor abused by her husband, kills him. Blood spurts on the screen.
Comedy, farce, action, horror and drama intertwine in succession. We understand that the work will play on all registers to fully embrace and ignite its subject. The character of Denise, for his part, is essential, although secondary. He is, “faced with heroines who choose themselves and who win”as Sanda Codreanu points out, this reminder of the harsh reality and the sad fate that is all too often reserved for women in society when they complain of domestic violence.
A liberating radicality
The bias taken by Noémie Merlant is radical. His point is anything but touched on. And it's invigorating. Finally, an action film about women who take hold of the patriarchy and twist its neck by constantly testing it. The staging is theatrical, almost going against the grain of the minimalism so sought after in cinema. The director reshuffles the cards of the game and loosens the codes of cinematographic genres, in particular those of the romantic comedy, which she inverts to let us hear words that are still too rarely uttered in the cinema.
There are numerous close-ups on the faces of the actresses and their acting is very explicit, without half-measures. The work around the way these female bodies move is worth highlighting. Sanda Codreanu, a true revelation of this feature film, remembers a “physically demanding shoot”. Indeed, we have the impression of witnessing the live deployment of an abundant cinematographic choreography.
According to the actress, Noémie Merlant drew her inspiration from the 7e Korean art. A word of advice: do not try to please. “These women are beautiful because they are alive”explains Sanda Codreanu. Alive, yes, they are more than ever. Even boiling, like the scorching weather in which the entire work evolves. A work whose purpose should concern everyone. “Men don't like to be made fun of and that's precisely what the film doesemphasizes Sanda Codreanu. But they should understand that they will be the first losers who do not join the feminist struggle. » When the actress is reminded of perhaps the easiest argument that the film could be criticized for, namely a possible lack of nuance in the treatment of the subject, she immediately responds: “So what?” I'm also a big consumer of films about guys who rob banks and who are superheroes, so please focus for two seconds on what we have to say, we who represent half the planet. »
Nicole, “the eye of the beholder”
Sanda Codreanu brilliantly plays her first main role on the big screen, that of Nicole, around whom the film revolves. In it, the young woman is full of complexes and paradoxes. She admires as much as she envies her friends: one is an accomplished actress, the other completely accepts her body. Quite the opposite of Nicole who tries as best she can to write a novel. However, without her, a true figure of sorority, there is no story. She is the voice of creation. “The book she writes over the course of the film is the scenario that unfoldssays Sanda Codreanu. Nicole is the eye of the viewer that awakens and becomes aware of reality. »
Indeed, his character is not spared. Nicole is “this bridge between the idealized dream and the brutality of the truth”. Throughout the film, she is haunted by the ghosts of attackers and especially by that of her neighbor onto whom she projected her ideal of Prince Charming, before he revealed his true face.
A way for Noémie Merlant to represent the bourgeois intellectual pole and to show to what extent society is corrupted by the patriarchal system, according to the actress. “Nicole, it’s a bit like Snow White waking up”she notes. She finds it hard to believe the nightmarish turn her dream is taking. However, she will go through with this work of awakening, even if it is painful, and it is she who will change the course of the story. “The mystery of a woman is not a choice, it is a punishment”Nicole pronounces in the film. Women on the balcony are the embodiment of these words.
Women on the balconyby and with Noémie Merlant, with Souheila Yacoub, Sanda Codreanu and Lucas Bravo, 1h43, in cinemas on December 11, 2024.
