Top 200 Most Anticipated Foreign Films of 2023: #74. Patricia Mazuy’s Portraits trompeurs

Portraits trompeurs

Two decades after working together on the Un Certain Regard selected Saint-Cyr (2020), Patricia Mazuy is set to reteam with Isabelle Huppert and the always-convincing Hafsia Herzi on Portraits trompeurs. Production has actually not yet begun but we’re looking at a production start this month or next which means we could see this play year-end fests and a late domestic release. Co-written by François Bégaudeau, Pierre Courrège and Mazuy, the screenplay looks at two women sharing the burden of having their husbands incarcerated and the bound that develops between them. Production will take place in Metz and Strasbourg. Mazuy’s sixth feature will dig deep into that dynamic and what is rare in her filmography is that this will almost be back to back projects in terms of timeframe as Bowling Saturne (read review) premiered in Locarno last year. Arte France Cinema supported this project.

Gist: This tells of an unlikely friendship between two women whose husbands are in prison. A meeting between a courageous young mother and a refined bourgeois woman. What brings them together? The hardships? Loneliness? One will help the other. Or maybe it’s the other way around…

Release Date/Prediction: If this does indeed drop in 2023, we’re thinking Venice.