Road 190 by Charlotte Nastasi and Emilie Cornu, which premiered last spring at Visions du Réel, is now on show at the Brussels International Film Festival (BRIFF), in the National Competition. It’s the feature-length documentary debut by the two auteurs: Nastasi is a graduate of the IAD in Belgium, where she directed her first short film and graduation film, Un sicilien et les femmes, while Cornu is a criminal psychologist.

Road 190 begins with a beautiful and intriguing shot – a frame within a frame within a frame. We see a prisoner, motionless (or very nearly) in the visiting room, and hear his monologue as a voiceover. Mabry has been on death row for more than ten years. He has had more than enough time to think about his life, and to weigh up his actions and his worldview. Mabry has nothing to do other than wonder how he has got to this point. He states the facts with surprising lucidity. Today, one would probably say that it’s a certain type of toxic masculinity that has led him to this juncture. In his cell, he has learned to be patient, and day after day, he imagines the last time he will ever leave it – his final journey to his place of execution. While he has begun to display a certain resilience, he is still left with some bitterness. Especially when he thinks about the warders, who every day live side by side with convicts sentenced to death, and who nonetheless form a guard of honour during their final journey.

In parallel with Mabry’s words, we explore the region and the inhabitants of these towns and cities encircled by prisons, whose daily life is governed by the rhythm of the executions. This state violence – or even these “state murders”, as they are described by a clutch of lonely demonstrators – is reflected in the latent violence simmering throughout the community. Weapons, especially, are everywhere. Here, they go hunting from the most tender of ages. This is rural USA, where people go to church, play softball in front of the prison walls, extol the virtues of self-defence, learn to shoot as a family and have a drink with friends in between line dances. At the local fast-food joint, they order a Killer Burger or an Electric Chair. The directors have conducted a thorough exploration of the road that leads from the jail where Mabry is being held to the one where he will be executed. It’s a way of trying to get to know, albeit not always successfully understand, these Americans who are mostly at peace with living in the shadow of the death penalty. This simple documentary highlights a culture gap that’s sometimes hard to grasp.

Road 190 was produced by Close Up Films (Switzerland) and Stenola Productions (Belgium).