When it was screened on French TV ,the movie found a huge audience .
It was not the first time the harsh subject of beaten wives had been tackled ,but it was never treated in such a realistic (and thus often unbearable way).
Alexandra is a nice girl ,but a very naive one:it seems that she marries Marcello to challenge her father who warns her against this violent man who was once married with a woman who says the same :' get away from him!"
She lived with him for 14 years!14 years of daytime nighttime sufferings ,black and blue,her arm in a sling,limping ...nothing is spared the audience;even the children are battered .
Marcello is a complex character:he looks nice and gentle,and we're told he was himself beaten by his father when he was a boy;every time her unfortunate wife leaves him,he makes her come back home by promising he will be "different" .
Alex who gave up her studies even supports him several times,particularly before her dad and her brother;she hides her bruised legs ;she does not want her dream (her nightmare?) to end.
The movie is treated as a trial with long flashbacks depicting Alex's ordeal;she killed her husband in self-defense: he was threatening her children;the final plea of the prosecutor vindicates the defendant;he puts the society on trial: no one came to Alex's rescue:the only help she got was from her dad (who tried to cheat the police) and from her best friend (who,unexpectedly coming to visit her ,discovered her husband prostituted her ).Actually,Marcello was a victim too ,of a childhood who made him a pathologically jealous man;he could probably have been cured ,but they looked the other way.
At the end of this MTV work,statistics about beaten wives appear:they are numerous and many of them don't dare to speak.
It was not the first time the harsh subject of beaten wives had been tackled ,but it was never treated in such a realistic (and thus often unbearable way).
Alexandra is a nice girl ,but a very naive one:it seems that she marries Marcello to challenge her father who warns her against this violent man who was once married with a woman who says the same :' get away from him!"
She lived with him for 14 years!14 years of daytime nighttime sufferings ,black and blue,her arm in a sling,limping ...nothing is spared the audience;even the children are battered .
Marcello is a complex character:he looks nice and gentle,and we're told he was himself beaten by his father when he was a boy;every time her unfortunate wife leaves him,he makes her come back home by promising he will be "different" .
Alex who gave up her studies even supports him several times,particularly before her dad and her brother;she hides her bruised legs ;she does not want her dream (her nightmare?) to end.
The movie is treated as a trial with long flashbacks depicting Alex's ordeal;she killed her husband in self-defense: he was threatening her children;the final plea of the prosecutor vindicates the defendant;he puts the society on trial: no one came to Alex's rescue:the only help she got was from her dad (who tried to cheat the police) and from her best friend (who,unexpectedly coming to visit her ,discovered her husband prostituted her ).Actually,Marcello was a victim too ,of a childhood who made him a pathologically jealous man;he could probably have been cured ,but they looked the other way.
At the end of this MTV work,statistics about beaten wives appear:they are numerous and many of them don't dare to speak.