Porte sans clef
Pascale Bodet
France, 2018, 79 min, colour, French
Porte sans clef is an odd comedy. A woman, the film-maker, puts up several friends in her home. But she doesn't give them the key. To go out all they have to do is leave and close the door, but to get in there must be someone at home. The house is, to a certain extent, a refuge. In this refuge, and in the nearby streets, small incidents occur, unsettling details, a theft, the typical legal swindling of a telephone company, a declaration of love, a little sewing and lots more. All these encounters create a kind of brusque slapstick. Though doesn’t slapstick involve a series of blows? Here, of course, there are blows too. Also, all the actresses and actors, including the film-maker herself, have a highly distinctive physical grace. You simply have to see them talking to one another, not understanding one another, doing exercise, serving coffee, eating and hitting each other. All of them are seen and directed for what they are: distinct people but at the same time all human, needing certain things, needing for example a place to be, a refuge, a roof.
