Martha...Martha (2002)

Synopsis: Dedicated "to the need for consolation," Sandrine Veysset's MARTHA...MARTHA tells the incredibly bleak tale of a woman who collapses under the weight of her own desperation. Martha (played with reckless abandon by Valerie Donzelli), a... Dedicated "to the need for consolation," Sandrine Veysset's MARTHA...MARTHA tells the incredibly bleak tale of a woman who collapses under the weight of her own desperation. Martha (played with reckless abandon by Valerie Donzelli), a young wife and mother, begins to loathe the quiet, boring life she has managed to carve for herself. Her kind, dedicated husband, Reymond (Yann Goven), senses that Martha is losing her balance, but refrains from intervening in order to keep the family together. When a spur of the moment vacation to visit Martha's sister in Spain turns ugly, Reymond realizes that the happy life he envisioned for himself, as well as his daughter Lise (Lucie Regnier), is spiraling out of control. This fear is confirmed after a brutal sequence of events trigger Martha's disappearance. When Martha returns to his and Lise's life months later, she has become a completely different person, forcing Reymond and Lise to dig deep within in order to find the strength to accept her as she is. In crafting a film that relentlessly addresses the issue of individual mental isolation, Veysset challenges audiences in a way that even the most hardened viewer will have a difficult time swallowing. MARTHA...MARTHA is a disturbing, haunting, and deeply exhausting work from an extremely talented filmmaker. This film screened as part of the Film Comment Selects series organized by the Film Society of Lincoln Center in New York City. [More]

Starring: Valerie Donzelli, Yann Goven, Lucie Regnier, Lydia Andrei

Starring: Valerie Donzelli, Yann Goven, Lucie Regnier, Lydia Andrei, Severine Vincent, Javier Cruz

Director: Sandrine Veysset

Director: Sandrine Veysset
Screenwriter: Sandrine Veysset, Sebastian Regnier
Producer: Humbert Balsan

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