Direction: François Ozon
Country: France / Belgium
François Ozon’s By The Grace of God explores a weighty theme, taking on the catholic church molestation cover-up with fierce determination. Confronting factors such as psychological damage, forgiveness, repent, and punishment, this drama film focuses on the particular sex scandal involving Father Bernard Preynat, a child predator whose sick conduct was neglected for years by his superiors. Ozon goes exactly to the central question: why monsters like these, who live hidden behind an institution, are not punished according to their crimes?
This tightly patterned account is set in Lyon and involves several victims of the Father Preynat (Bernard Verley). Coming from different backgrounds, they are Alexandre Guérin (versatile Melvil Poupaud), 40, a banker and family man who cannot be silent anymore after realizing that the priest who abused him as a child over the course of two years was reassigned and keeps giving mass and working with children; François Debord (Denis Ménochet), a married man who takes Alexandre’s actions further by organizing a collective movement in order to call the attention of the media; and Emmanuel Thomassin (Swann Arlaud), a man in a toxic relationship, who frequently suffers seizures. All of them, and a few more, refuse to succumb to the trauma and agonizing memories that haunt them every day, and resolve to fight for justice. Cardinal Philip de Barbarin (François Marthouret), whose conduct is as impassive as Preynat is repulsive, is a key figure here as he tries to protect the institution and tone down the case. The guilt of those who knew but didn’t talk is also mentioned.
Mutating into a documentary-style approach, Ozon has a talented cast helping him stabilize the narrative disproportion whenever the film goes up and down in tone. Sometimes, we have the feeling that the story doesn’t go anywhere, but what the film lacks in the tension department, it compensates in exposing an uncomfortable truth that led Preynat to attempt blocking the release of the film in court.
