STAY SANE

HORS D’HALEINE

2024 / 101 min / color

Emma is the central character of Luxembourger Eric Lamhene’s feature debut. At first glance, she has a privileged life: a loving husband, a great job at an architectural firm, a beautiful home. We meet her just as she’s admitted to the hospital after supposedly falling down a flight of stairs. When she tells the doctors that she doesn’t want her husband to visit her, it’s the first sign that the official version of her fall might not be true. Thanks to a suggestion made discreetly by her doctor, Emma is taken to a women’s shelter for victims of domestic abuse. At first, she doesn’t feel comfortable there, and insists that she has already shared everything that happened. But denial is a common defence mechanism for people who have experienced violence, whether physical or psychological. Emma slowly opens up, feeling a solidarity with the other women in the center as they share the burden of their troubled experiences. Lamhene’s film is a moving story of women determined to fight for themselves and start over. The performances are remarkable — especially Carla Juri, who skilfully captures the wide spectrum of emotions experienced by her character.