21/05/2024 - CANNES 2024: Noémie Merlant presents a confident second feature mixing comedy, drama and horror with some supernatural elements, to a delightful result

Sanda Codreanu, Souheila Yacoub and Noémie Merlant in The Balconettes

“Can you call the police? I’m not sure I can hide how delighted I am,” is not a phrase you’d expect to hear from someone who has just committed murder in self-defence. Laughing, Denise (Nadège Beausson-Diagne) confides in her neighbour Nicole (Sanda Codreanu) about the “accidental” death of her abusive husband, which we see at the beginning of The Balconettes [+see also:
interview: Noémie Merlant
film profile], Noémie Merlant’s sophomore feature, which has premiered as one of Cannes’ Midnight Screenings.

The French actress-writer-director introduced her nuanced views on sisterhood and male-female relationships in her 2021 feature debut, Mi Iubita Mon Amour [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (a Cannes Special Screening), and now shows us what she's capable of, unafraid and soaring. The Balconettes mixes comedy, drama and horror with some supernatural elements, to a delightful result; it emerges as one of the most distinguished artistic visions on the Croisette as it sinks its teeth into topics of gender-based violence.

But that’s not all: what Merlant does with this film is not only brave, but also playful. As a director, she manages to be politically sharp and imaginative when telling the story of three friends dealing with abuse trauma during a heat wave in the south of France. From the very first shot, it’s obvious that Marseille is a place to fall in love with, as crane shots track across coquettish window panes, balconies and their signature blue, wooden blinds. Cinematographer Evgenia Alexandrova (Mi Iubita Mon Amour, Heartless [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]) uses all the tools at her disposal to make the film’s visual style attend to a dichotomy – exterior-interior and distance-proximity – with a compelling dynamism as she moves between handheld close-ups and tracking shots that plunge into the scene, into an apartment.

There, fiction writer Nicole shares a home with her friend Ruby (Souheila Yacoub). The two make an intriguing pair: while Nicole daydreams in erotic paragraphs about the neighbour across the road on his little balcony (Lucas Bravo from Emily in Paris), Ruby is a camgirl: sex is her profession, and sexuality is her means of expression. On that sweltering summer day, their actress friend Élise (Merlant) pays them a surprise visit. She jumps out of her car and runs up to the flat in full Marilyn Monroe costume and in dismay: she has just driven down from Paris after a fight with her husband (who doesn’t seem like a great man already). From that moment on, the plot unspools, one crazy event after another, most of which involve the nameless (but purposefully handsome) neighbour. Can you guess if he’s a good man or not?

The film has the same urgency and openness as those of Céline Sciamma (who collaborated with Merlant on the script), all the while very much remaining the actor-director’s own artistic vision of a flamboyant, courageous womanhood. Throughout The Balconettes, prepare to laugh and gasp, to applaud and cheer, as this joyous celebration of female friendship takes every surprising turn possible. An unlikely (male) body part kept in the freezer, a tragically quiet cam stream, a ridiculously realistic scene at the gyno and the hope for redemption are some of the significant bits of the film that come together to tell a story that we, as women, can never tell by ourselves.

The Balconettes was produced by Nord-Ouest Films in co-production with France 2 Cinéma. mk2 films handle the film’s world sales.