Synopsis
How do you reconstruct the image of a grandmother you never knew when her memory has been veiled by a family taboo since her passing in 1946? Between the spoken and the unspoken, we hear intertwined voices gradually unveiling Germaine’s story. Memories of her children remain vivid, yet they are accompanied by haunting questions from the past. What if this family secret mirrored the experiences of many French women during the first half of the 20th century?
A word from Tënk
In Le carnet russe, Claire Latxague sets out to decipher her mother's 1966 agenda. Perhaps it will teach her something about this woman whom she knew little about? The only problem: it's in Russian, a language Claire doesn't speak.
With the aptly named Germaine ou la retenue – because the narrative demonstrates a beautiful restraint – she continues her quest for her origins and reflections on transmission. This time, she questions the trajectory of her paternal grandmother, who died of tetanus in 1946. The large family that Germaine left behind then composes a polyphony that allows the filmmaker to slowly piece together the fragments of information that the family has passed down – and to uncover those that were preferred to be kept silent. They are scattered, because "talking about Germaine meant talking about sad things. So we avoided talking about it."
By starting with a woman who experienced "72 months of pregnancies," this investigative documentary skillfully blends personal narratives, "direct cinema," testimonies, and interviews.
It also subtly traces a common history among women of that generation, regardless of the country they were born in.
Jenny Cartwright
Documentarian and audio artist
English transcription available here.
