Mélanie Doutey and Jalil Lespert, a new screen couple for Delphine Noels’ camera

by Aurore Engelen

01/02/2012 - This week, shooting started for Post Partum, Delphine Noels’ first feature film, in Luxemburg. Noels first caught critics attention with her two award-winning short films 1 clé pour 2 (2005) and Bunny Games (Ni oui ni nom) (2007). With Post Partum, she again explores the idea of a couple. Luce and Ulysses are young, good-looking, and happy. The birth of their daughter Rose should complete this idyll, but Luce feels that something is wrong. Why would Rose cry so much if everything was alright? Isn’t her crying the sign of something more serious, deeper, of a danger that will threaten this beautiful balance?

On this timeless yet under-explored theme of postnatal depression, that we recently saw in A Happy Event (Un heureux évènement) [trailer], Noels has chosen a psychological drama that borders on a thriller, to project the mother’s symptoms. The roles of Luce and Ulysses have been taken on by first-time screen couple Mélanie Doutey [photo], who is to make a comeback with Aux yeux de tous [trailer] by Arnaud Duprey and Cédric Jiménez this March, and Jalil Lespert, whose second feature film, Des vents contraires [trailer], came out last December and was a great success.

Post Partum is co-produced by Frakas Productions, Les Productions Balthazar, and Paul Thiltges Distributions, with support from the Centre du Cinéma de la Fédération Wallonie - Bruxelles, Wallimage, Tax Shelter, and FONSPA, for a budget of €2.8m.

The film is co-written by David Lambert, whose first film Hors les murs [trailer, film focus], also produced by Frakas, is in final stages of post-production and should be screened this spring. Up Frakas’ sleeve are also Bye Bye Blondie [trailer] by Virgine Despentes, to be released in France on March 21, and to be distributed in Belgium by Lumière, as well as two feature films in production, Morrocan Gigolos by Ismaël Saïdi and Pianissimo by André Buytaers.

(Translated from French)