comedy / Suisse, Luxembourg, France / original title : La Cache / Color / status : completed / French / long feature-film
Paris, May ‘68: A 9-year-old boy is thrilled to stay a few extra days with his grandparents in their perennial apartment, joined by his two lively uncles— a visual artist and an aspiring intellectual—and his colourful great grandmother from Odessa, while his parents join the historical protests. As the country is turned upside down, the family is forced to confront the past when an illustrious guest seeks shelter in their venerated hideout.
A buoyant comedy exploring the free-spirited dynamics of a family during the famous student protests that swept through France in May ‘68. An eccentric family portrait, adapted from a novel written by one of its members, Christophe Boltanski, nephew of the renowned visual artist Christian Boltanski.
Press
«On the one hand, Lionel Baier’s comedy is a great croquembouche of cute characters and whimsy. (...) It’s all very charming, a gooey pleasure. You can simply believe everything, because there’s nothing wrong with having a good imagination: it gives luster to a life that might otherwise seem dull. And there is nothing dull about life in The Safe House.»
DEADLINE
«Lionel Baier sets an incredibly emancipated adaptation of Christophe Boltanski’s eponymous novel amidst good humor, framed by a forceful desire for narrative freedom and carried by a hectic pace, sustained by formal inventiveness based upon a cheeky comic book spirit.(...) Emphasising imagination and faith, the film broaches many serious and intelligent subjects which resonate with the darker pages of Europe’s past, but also with our present.(...) A playful and joyous experiment, highly accessible to wider audiences and embellished with an array of daring visual innovations.»
CINEUROPA
