CW: Infanticide
Saint Omer is a film directed by Alice Diop about the trial of a young mother who is accused of killing her 15-month-old daughter. We follow Rama (Kayije Kagame), a novelist who attends the trial whilst fighting her own battle.
The film is based on a case which made headlines in the French media several years ago. Fabienne Kabou (represented by the character Laurence in the film) drowned her child and blamed her actions on evil witchcraft controlling her actions. It is often commented that this woman was remarkably intelligent and in the film Alice Diop reflects on how people are always surprised when foreign women, especially from Senegal, are clever and well spoken. This should not have been a surprise to the people in the court room. We see this again when one of Laurence’s (Guslagie Malanda) professors take the stand and criticise that she decided to study Wittgenstein, someone so far away from ‘her own culture’.
Critics described the film as weak; I disagree. There was so much in what Laurence Coly doesn’t say. I believe she doesn’t understand what she did or why. It is so rare that maternal or paternal figures kill their children, especially women. There is a bond between mothers and their children that is usually an unconditional and unbreakable love. So what makes a mother kill her child? What snaps within them to believe that taking this young life away is the only option? Her inability to answer many of the questions speaks to her inability to comprehend her actions.
The viewer is also left in the dark as to the reasons behind Laurence’s actions. Madness seems to be the only consensus. This is something that slipped my mind until mentioned at the end of the film, she could only have been mad. Her dictation is always hazy and never clear, her thoughts masked in poetic justice. When questioned on this she claims “Somethings we can’t be clear about. And if I was lying, I can’t know why?” her language is seductive which in a way makes her an unreliable narrator. When Rama muses over her book title with her partner Adrian (Thomas de Pourquery), they discuss Medea and how the publishers believe that she should change the name of her book because people don’t know who Medea is. But who doesn’t know the most infamous mad woman in history? Its almost as though we have forgotten that mothers can go mad. That maybe it isn’t their fault and there are other things at play slowly pushing them over the edge.
Laurence seemed more of a reliable source than Luc Dumontet (Xavier Maly), the man she lived with and had a child with. Its hard to believe anything a man says when he masks an affair from his family. Luc’s word is against hers. He claims they were in love – this they agree. They had a beautiful affair, this is clear. Most people discuss Laurence as being kind, caring and patient. Important virtues in good parenting and surprising virtues for a mother who murdered her child. Laurence states that the only sexual experience she has ever had was with Luc. Yet later in the trial we are reflecting on an argument they had where Luc said, “Are you sure she’s mine?” to which Laurence replies “Don’t worry she’s mine”. By Laurence’s reasoning the baby isn’t Luc’s since he never cared enough about it, so why should it be his?
There is a lot of proof that Laurence’s mind is muddled. She claims that she felt the water when she walked her child into the sea, but in later reports she no longer remembers. Whether this is selective amnesia, madness, or a cover-up I suppose we cannot know for sure. She is guilty but is everything her fault? She uses her words in the court room to emphases the need for understanding and compassion. She can’t even understand what she did, blaming it on sorcery and a curse from her family.
Laurence uses seductive language, not crying for pity, but desperate for understanding. In one of the final scenes the defence attorney monologues to the Jury. She explains how women are Chimeras, we are compounded creatures existing as part madness. The camera pans to the women in the court room, each one moved and crying, because no matter how much of a monster Laurence is she is still part woman who, like all the others in the courtroom, has been disregarded and overlooked.
Rama sees Laurence in her concerns of motherhood: not being good enough. There is a scene when the two women both make eye contact and Laurence smiles and Rama cries. Diop could see aspects of her circumstances in the real-life case and Rama is used to demonstrate this. They understand one another, sharing the feeling of being so alone as they are both close with their mothers but don’t really feel their warmth and what it means to be properly loved. In the final scene Rama is holding her mother’s hand, her mother breathes how she is so tired. Rama just looks at her, a sense of understanding arises. She gazes off, there is a pregnant pause and the viewer can feel her thinking about motherhood.
“Alice Diop 2022 01” by Les Rencontres de Chaminadouris licensed under CC BY 3.0.