Surviving with wolves
Francia / 2007 / 90 min / Colour
Italian premiere
Misha's family is Jewish, and because of the Nazi persecutions is forced to take raguge in the Ardennes. During a round-up Misha's parents are captured but succeed in saving their daughter who is taken in as a scullery maid by a Catholic Family near Brussels. Badly treated and humiliated, with a burning desire to see her parents again and the knowledge that they were deported to Eastern Europe, Misha flees and embarks on a interminable voyage along the German plains, finally reaching Poland and Ukraine with the help of a compass and in the company of a pack of wolves. A transposition of the eponymous novel by Misha Defonseca, the film is a fairy tale in which the wolves are divided, metaphorically, into good (those who live in the forest and help Misha) and bad ( the Nazi wolves). By hiding in the woods, crawling on all fours, climbing trees, and rolling in the leaves, Misha seems to want to flee from the true monster: the human one. This is the tale of the ferocity of man and the humanity of animals.
Credits
Language Italian Subject Véra BelmontScreenplay Véera Belmont, Gerard MordillatCinematography Pierre CottereauSound Henri Morelle, Xavier PiroelleEditing Martine GiordanoMusic Émilie SimonProducer Linda GutenbergProduction company Stephan Film Les Aventuriers de l'Image