Human Flowers of Flesh

"I remember the boredom, the heat, the dust." That's how a soldier describes his time in the French Foreign Legion in Human Flowers of Flesh. "Everyone's looking for closeness and other bodies." That experience is shared by the five-member crew of a sailing yacht and their captain – played by Greek actress Angeliki Papoulia, known from the films by Yorgos Lanthimos. Fascinated by the legionnaires, her contemporary odyssey begins in Marseille. The personal merges with the collective in a hypnotic and sensual journey through space, language and time. In the footsteps of Claire Denis' Beau Travail (1999), actor Denis Lavant appears in his soldiers' boots. Director-screenwriter Helena Wittmann shot the film herself on 16mm film. Her second feature is of a great sensory and almost mythical beauty.