Five years after her remarkable La Fille au Bracelet, Stéphane Demoustier is back behind the camera with undisguised pleasure with Borgo, her new feature film, in theaters April 17, 2024.
Inspired by a true story, that of the execution of Antoine Quilichini and Jean-Luc Codaccioni, two members of Corsican organized crime, at Bastia airport in 2017, and the involvement of a prison guard in the tragic unfolding of events, Borgo looks back at the criminal investigation, but also - and above all - at the singular path and context that led the young woman to put her fingers in this spiral that quickly overtook her.
Hafsia Herzi lends her features and strong character to Mélissa, an experienced 32-year-old housewife who has recently moved to Corsica with her two young children and husband. Faced with racism from some locals, they try to integrate and start a new life under the sun of the Isle of Beauty. We don't actually see much of Corsica, as the film takes place largely within the four walls of Borgo, the prison south of Bastia.
Mélissa is assigned to a very special unit, an open-regime ward for Corsican inmates, a sort of "Club Med" according to those concerned, where they can spend their days outside their cells, playing cards and smoking cigarettes. Faced with the misogyny of some prisoners, Mélissa's integration is facilitated by Saveriu(Louis Memmi), an influential young Corsican whom she met on the mainland at Fleury-Mérogis prison, before their transfer to the other side of the Mediterranean.
Cleverly shifting between different temporalities, Borgo takes up the codes of the thriller through the medium of intimacy, trying to pinpoint the motivations of a young woman who was in no way predisposed to become an actor in such a deadly ambush. Simply the collateral damage of a pernicious situation? Despite appearances, Stéphane Demoustier has created a fascinating new film, filled with a great humanity crystallized in a scene as cheerful as it is moving, the collective cover - in Corsican in the text - of Julien Clerc's song Mélissa.
