The Horla (2022)

In the Paris metro, there’s a man in a black mask. An anti-vax demonstration passes by the indifferent camera. The man goes home, the sound of social anger following him inside, but nothing seems to matter to him except his business with his double whom he finds inside the white walls The curve of his shaved head mirrors the sculpture behind him on the mantelpiece. Portraits appear in his back. Elsewhere, on the banks of the Seine, a woman and a dog look out into the distance, as if they’re waiting for something to happen. Pierre Creton’s adaptation of Maupassant’s short story is startling in its luminous serenity. It is above all a portrait, a black-and-white study of a body, a face and their clear, opaque beauty. Paying attention to it all is enough to ward off the ghosts and the madness. (Cyril Neyrat)