Submerged hints of suffering slowly surface in Faustine Cros’ absorbing and gently moving, and deftly insightful, A Life Like Any Other (Une vie comme une autre) as she uses archival material shot by her filmmaker father, as well as her own intimate interviews, to delve into her mother’s barely noticed depression that ultimately led to a suicide attempt that traumatised the entire family.
The winner of the Prize of the Interreligious Jury, Silver Dove (International Competition) at the recent DOK Leipzig, the film begins in simple style as Cros delivers mild-mannered footage of her family around their country house – her father always busy and her mother, Valérie, often sat silently at the kitchen table deep in thought.
Valérie’s suicide attempt shocks the family and Cros decides to look into footage shot by her father Jean-Louis over the years to look for hints, clues and perhaps answers, even. New footage is subsequently shot by the director focussing on Valérie, a make-up artist, brother Ferdinand and the family dog Erbe.
The mother says plaintively after the suicide bid: “It all seems so far away. I don’t have any memories of it because I swallowed so many pills…It was an act of great cowardice,” while her daughter simply says to her:” It came out of the blue for us.”
Her father’s footage includes the day of Faustine’s birth; her early days as a toddler and being fed lunch with her brother Ferdinand. Valérie seems busy being a homemaker but is also frustrated that she no longer gets regular work as a well-paid film-industry professional.
In one sequence she returns from a regular family shop, and is filmed (with microphone in place) by her husband. Her frustration bubbles through. “I don’t like my life,” she says. “I don’t feel alive…I’m surviving thanks to antidepressants.” She can’t stand the daily routine anymore, blaming the entire society. In tears she says: “I think I want to say this to men…It’s a shitty fucking society.”
While putting on make-up her now 60 year-old mother comments to her daughter: “The gaze is important.” Certainly this is a key theme. The camera watched and recorded Valérie for years but only now does it offer clues to the depression that haunted her. But Valérie herself doesn’t have any clear answers – she only knows she wanted to disappear.
Towards the end of the film director Cros turns the camera on her father as he stands on the roof fitting an aerial to the chimney. She talks about the footage he shot all those years ago of her mother sadly and angrily talking after her grocery shop. “I wonder if she was blaming you in some way,” Cros says to her father. “For her distress you mean? It was a long time ago. I don’t remember …but maybe,” he responds.
In a voice over Cros adds that over the years she was told her mother had “the crying sickness.” She adds: ”But is it really a sickness to care about one’s freedom.” Closing footage sees the family gathered in the garden dancing…her mother is focussed and unsmiling, but is the one leading the family dance.
Belgium-France, 2022, 68mins
Dir: Faustine Cros
Production: Derives, Les Films d’ici
International sales: Lightdox
Producers: Julie Freres, Camille Laemie
Cinematography: Faustine Cros, Jean-Louis Cros
Editors: Faustine Cros, Cédric Zoenen
Music: Ferdinand Cros
With: Valérie Declef-Cros, Jean-Louis Cros, Ferdinand Cros, Faustine Cros
