The Innocents, set in Poland in 1945, tells the true story of the Red Cross doctor Madeleine Pauliac (“Mathilde” in the film) who cared for Benedictine nuns who were violated and, in some cases, made pregnant by Soviet soldiers. The French director Anne Fontaine (Coco Before Chanel) shows the nuns going through feelings of shame, faith, love and motherhood, while a strong friendship develops between Mathilde, an atheist communist, and Maria, one of the nuns.
I met Fontaine while she was presenting The Innocents at the London Film Festival.
How did you come across this story?
The French producers the Altmayer brothers came to me one day and said: “We have a story for you. We know that this story is for you.” I was very curious to know what kind of story it was. And they started talking about this incredible story, about this convent where many Sisters were pregnant after being raped by the Soviet army.
They knew the story because they had met Philippe Maynial, the nephew of the French doctor of the Red Cross. Philippe was in possession of a diary where all the details were written and he had the idea of making a movie about Madeleine Pauliac.
He worked alone for two or three years and nothing happened. He then wrote a script with two young writers, and one day the Altmayer brothers came across it and they thought: “Anne will be the right person to make this movie.”
At first I was surprised that they had thought about me. I couldn’t understand why. But very quickly I felt proximity with this story. I felt touched, of course, because nobody can fail to be touched by it. It was interesting to have these existential questions about faith, about maternity, about violence, about love.
I did some historical research to be sure that the events really happened in Poland.
I wanted to set the movie in Poland because, even though similar things happened in other countries, Poland is a very Catholic country and I knew that it was a hidden story. The research clearly showed that similar events happened in three places in Poland.
What was the hardest thing about making the movie?
The thing that was difficult at the beginning was that I didn’t know one word of Polish and many of the actors and actresses didn’t speak French or English. Communicating is something where you have to be patient with yourself and also be confident. That was difficult at the beginning.
After that, the most difficult thing was trying to be as close to the truth as possible, not pushing the emotions. I like it when the emotions are sober, inside, hidden. This was complicated because this is the kind of movie that can be too much, where everybody cries all the time. I told Lou de Laâge [the actress playing the French doctor]: “Don’t cry, be cold. You are not Miss Compassion. No, it doesn’t help people being like that.”
The film has been shown at the Vatican. How did the audience react?
We showed two screenings to only Religious people, and it was so strong to see that all these monks, Sisters and archbishops were so touched by the movie. At the end of the film a Spanish archbishop took the microphone and said that this movie was therapeutic to the Church and that it was very important to know about these realities in France, too.
He also said that the movie respected the Christian way of life and he added that the story was a very modern one because, sadly, today we see situations similar to the one portrayed in the film around the world. In countries at war, for example, where there is fanaticism and where rape is common.
In today’s world many women are abused and some of them find themselves pregnant with a baby who was conceived in violence. What does the film tells us about this reality?
The Sisters make the choice to keep the babies because birth is life. Even if there was violence at the beginning, life is stronger than everything and the movie goes into this message.
What other message do you want to convey to the audience?
I want this movie to give hope. From the beginning, I was sure that the beauty, the way I lit the faces of the characters … I wanted this to give characters also a “light inside” – even though what they are going through is very difficult, of course. The film wants to tell people to have hope and to have transcendence. I think when you finish watching the movie, you have hope, you are not left only with hell.
The Innocents is released in Britain on November 11
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