听 Veteran documentarian Raymond Depardon was given special permission to film inside a Parisian courtroom for three months in this absorbing doc, which offers a revealing, and at times amusing, portrait of contemporary French society. The 10th District Court concentrates on a dozen different cases, ranging from drink driving and domestic harassment to pick-pocketing and illegal immigration. The accused plead their cases in front of a redoubtable female judge Mich猫le Bernard-Raquin, who decides their sentences.
There are just a handful of camera set-ups in The 10th District Court: one at eye-level for Bernard-Raquin, another at a lower angle for the defendants and the prosecuting attorneys. Yet this minimalist approach pays real dividends, for we focus on the testimonies and expressions of the participants, many of whom exist on society's margins. Thus a man with a history of mental health and drug problems admits to taking a tranquilliser before his court appearance charged with possessing an illegal weapon. Another from a deprived neighbourhood insists that without a driving licence, he's unable to find work.
"BRINGS OUT THE THEATRICALITY"
Depardon brings out the theatricality of the legal proceedings - the entrances and exits, the speeches, the roles, and the performances - and the difficulties in arriving at definitive verdicts of guilt or innocence, a point reinforced by the fact that we never learn the outcomes of the last two trials.
In French with English subtitles.
