21/02/2011

For the past week, shooting has been in full swing in Le Havre on Lucas Belvaux’s eighth feature, French/Belgian co-production 38 Witnesses. After The Right of the Weakest [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (in competition at Cannes in 2006) and Rapt [+see also:
trailer
interview: Lucas Belvaux
film profile] (2009), the director is once again exploring a crime story, this time a murder that took place in New York in the 1960s.

For the cast, the director has reunited with trusted actor Yvan Attal (nominated for Best Actor César 2010 for Rapt), who stars alongside Sophie Quinton (Nobody Else But You [+see also:
trailer
film profile]), Natacha Régnier (Orly [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]) and Nicole Garcia (Going South [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]).

Loosely based on Didier Decoin’s novel Est-ce Ainsi Que Les Femmes Meurent? (“Is This How Women Die?”), the film is scripted by Belvaux. It centres on Louise (Quinton) who returns from a work trip in China to discover that her street has been the scene of a crime.

There are no witnesses, everyone was asleep apparently. But as time passes, Louise finds out that 38 people saw or heard something, and her husband Pierre (Attal) is among them...

38 Witnesses is produced by Patrick Sobelman for Agat Films & Cie. Its €7.1m budget includes co-production support from France 3 Cinéma and Belgium’s Artémis Production, pre-acquisitions from Canal + and Ciné Cinéma, backing from the Haute-Normandie region, the Belgian French Community, Belgian tax shelter and the Eurimages fund.

Shooting is scheduled to last nine weeks. Diaphana will distribute the title in France and Cinéart in Belgium, while international sales are still under negotiation.

(Translated from French)