BLACK SHEEP

ROSALIE

2023 / 115 min / color

Stéphanie Di Giusto’s latest movie, which premiered to great acclaim at last year’s Cannes Film Festival, unfolds in a small French village in the 1870s. The beautiful and mysterious Rosalie (a great performance by rising star of French cinema Nadia Tereszkiewicz) marries Abel (Benoît Magimel), the owner of a local café. Drowning in debt, Abel jumps into the relationship to get Rosalie’s dowry, unaware of her dark secret: Rosalie’s whole face and body are covered with thick hair that she carefully shaves off. When her husband finds out the truth, Rosalie initially suffers from his rejection. But then she comes up with the idea to just let her hair grow out and become a local curiosity, attracting clients to the café who are hungry for new sensations and want to see a bearded lady with their own eyes. Rosalie is a superbly acted ode to Otherness, enhanced by Hania Rani’s highly atmospheric musical score. The director spins this story of emancipation by showing how fear of the Other still very much characterizes our times. But like her brave protagonist, she sees being different as a source of power and strength that has a great potential to transform the reality of one’s circumstances.