A SCREAM FROM SILENCE (MOURIR A TUE-TETE)

Canada, 1979, 96 minutes, Colour.
Julie Vincent, Germaine Houde, Paul Savoie, Monique Miller, Micheline Lanctot.
Directed by Anne Clare Poirier.

A Scream from Silence is a film from Quebec in the late 1970s. It is very disturbing indeed. While it is a feature film, it also takes on the aspects of documentary, focusing on the issues of rape and its effect on the victim. It is very graphic in its presentation. The film also makes the point about making a film on such a subject and its effect on the film-makers.

The film has a strong female perspective, from writer and director to the cast. It is interesting in retrospect to see that this film was made at the end of the 1970s – and is still very relevant in succeeding decades. It could be compared with an American variation on this theme, Not a Love Story, directed by Martha Coolidge.

1. The purpose of the film? Documentary, didactic film, moralising? How well did it achieve its intentions? For a feminine audience? for a male audience?

2. The qualities of the Canadian production? Technical credits? The Canadian atmosphere - directly for a Canadian audience, reference to Canadian law? Its more universal appeal?

3. The qualities of the film as a feature film - potential for entertainment? The documentary style of the film - its sense of realism? The interview techniques - realistic interviews, the symbolic sequences at the end? The importance of the background of the director and the editor and their discussions about the film and its effects? Their choices for including sequences?

4. The revelation that the film was based on a real story? Audiences believing this, hesitant? The dramatisation of the story? The dilemma about the ending? The director stating that it was based on fact? The fact of the suicide?

5. The impact of the credits - the focus on the men, the descriptions? The later interviews? The slanting of the film against these men? The focus on rape, women's rights, injustice and oppression? The law?

6. The importance of the realities of law, the sequence in the court and the issues raised? The possibilities of protection - the final focus on the whistle - realism, symbolism and the significance of the whistles at the end?

7. The feminine point of view of the film - balance, militant? Communicating a sense of outrage, the feeling for women and the in justice of rape? The points of view of the director, the editor? The victims and the dramatisation in the courtroom? Susanne and her story, her ordinariness, the effect on her life? relationships, her death? The feminine point of view on rape, theories about the effect of rape, death?

8. Women as a significant minority in society, rape victims as a minority? The statement of the case in favour of their situation?

9. How well did the film dramatise the basic rape situation - Susanne and her work, walking home, the focus on the man himself, his appearance, manner of speaking, his contempt for Susanne as a woman? Her later reflections on this? His brutality, fear, hatred, violence? The lead-up to the physical rape? Sexuality? The comparisons of Susanne's news and interviews about the rape, from the police, from the director of the film? The impact of the talk about rape compared with the audience watching and dramatised situation? The camera taking the subjective position of Susanne and the man in some ways and raping the audience? The effect of dramatic technique?

10. The aftermath, Susanne returning home, contacting Phillip, the doctor and his questions about venereal disease? The photos and their indignity? The police interrogation and its manner, detail?

11. The personal interviews with Susanne and her remembering the situation, her comments on its effect on her? The significance of the sequence where her hair was combed and cut? The significance given to it by Susanne, the return to normality? The importance of the interview with the director?

12. Susanne and her not recovering? Work, relationship with Phillip, listlessness, not eating? The clashes with Phillip and the effect on him? His attempt at patience and sympathy - and his inability to sustain it?

13. The effect of the film of the court sequence - the different groups of women, the children, the masks and the telling of the individual stories, the focus on incest?

14. The reality and unreality of Susanne's suicide? Its being shocking? The effect on the audience?

15. The visual treatment of the rape situation - the styles of documentary, of a pornographic film to bring home the bluntness and the reality of the situation?

16. The helplessness of the rape victims? The place of women in society, the film and its indictment of society? Call for reform - its validity, cogency?