Loosely based on Florence Aubenas’ bestselling work of investigative journalism, ‘Le Quai de Ouistreham‘, (translated into English as ‘The Night Cleaner‘), the film focuses on the nuanced development of female friendships, the ethical ambiguity of writing and, more widely, the hardship of breadline economics and low-paid labour.
Director Emmanuel Carrère is himself also a celebrated novelist whose work seeks to push aesthetic and ethical boundaries and so, in guiding this film, the concept of a writer representing an economic experience they have the privilege to return from becomes part of the film’s unsettling, if unresolved, core.
A stunning central performance from Juliette Binoche is joined by a revelatory cast of non-professional actors, with Hélène Lambert (playing the impassioned and volatile single mum, Christèle) in particular shining through.
This is a moving and deceptively complex film that not only confronts the economics of socio-political exploitation, but also probes the murky depths of personal and artistic exploitation.