“How can you go from normal everyday life to crime?” : Discover the true story behind the creation of Borgo

Borgo, what does he say?

Melissa (Hapsia Hertz), a young prison guard, is transferred to Corsica with her family. If the move is a fresh start for her and her partner Jibril (Musa Mansali), they quickly discover that the island of beauty operates very differently than what the locals call “the continent.”

Locked in with the prisoners, Melissa can count on the influential and charismatic Saverio (Louis Memm) to calm the situation and ease the tension. But when he is released, their relationship suddenly changes. How far will Melissa be willing to go to help and fit in?

“How can you go from normal everyday life to crime?”

After The Girl with the Bracelet, which won the César for Best Adaptation in 2021, director Stéphane Demoustier returns with a new feature film that is just as mysterious. If the plot of his last film revolved around the potential guilt of its main character, brilliantly played by Melissa Gowers, Borgo doesn’t bother to prove it. It does not so much try to understand the causes of the criminal act, but to observe the consequences on the criminal, in particular, the latter’s reactions to the progressive deconstruction of his daily life, which leads to chaos.

“This one” is “this one” in this case. Done talented Hapsia Hertz, Cesar 2008 for Most Promising Actress In The Seed and the Mule, Melissa’s character fascinates with the gradual change in which she operates, constantly approaching a potential tipping point. At the beginning of its creation, very real news, among them Stephen Demostier got inspiration.

“My focus was on this guard whose story I found in the press,” he explains. A female prison guard – recently in Corsica – who finds herself embroiled in a feud between rival gangs. So in the story the guard acted as a trigger, but I didn’t want to paint a portrait of him or the environment he encountered.

“I have not conducted any research in this direction. On the contrary, all my work is written and then shot It consisted in distancing myself from the news, and approaching a fictional character as I imagined him, a character that is directly related to the question that the film presents: how we can go from ordinary everyday life to it in just a few months. criminal? Borgo tries to understand this change, or rather this shift.“

Strict investigation

However, this plot choice doesn’t stop at its singularity or the moral dilemma it questions, but also its setting. for that Stephen DemostierThe geographical location of Corsica played a major role in the development of the incident, which justified his feature film on the island.

“I have wanted to make a film in Corsica for a long time. This is a place that fascinates me as much as it does not escape me. We have all already experienced, of course, to varying degrees, the impression of being a stranger or a minority somewhere, in the sense that the language of the group, but sometimes simply the codes or culture escapes. Taking a French woman of North African descent and bringing her to an island like Corsica immediately put Melissa’s character in the shoes of a foreigner.

I didn’t phrase it that way, but Melissa Chad on an island that is de facto closed by its geographical location, Corsica is also a very strong micro-community. And Melissa goes to prison, which, by definition, is also a micro-society. Therefore, there is no doubt that there is a locking principle in Borgo that explains how everyone functions.“

Unlike Melissa, who discovers that the island functions for Corsica and its inhabitants, the police officers (Michel Fau and Pablo Pauli) are well aware of this and simultaneously conduct an in-depth investigation. Melissa’s moral dilemma, which gradually turns into a criminal, is compounded by the intrigue of an independent-looking police force. When these two stories come together, they allow the story to reach a new depth from which even the sublime panoramas of Corsica cannot distract you!

Borgo, with Stéphane Demoustier and Hafsia Hertz, can be seen in theaters this week.