Berlinale 2023. The Plough by Philippe Garrel wins the Silver Bear
6 March 2023
Berlinale 2023. The highly anticipated return of master Philippe Garrel with his movie The Plough, did not disappoint the expectations and brought home the Silver Bear for Best Director.
Starring Louis Garrel, Damien Mongin, Esther Garrel and Lena Garrel.
Distributed by Minerva Pictures.
Garrel returns behind the camera with a family history, delicate and powerful at the same time, rediscovering some of his most cherished themes: family, motherhood, art, separation and, finally, death.
You can have a child from someone you don’t love, and that same child can find a father in another man. You can renew your art a step away from the abyss to stay alive. Through fatigue, you can learn to intelligently collect a precious legacy, made of authentic passion and small gestures. And to renew oneself in order to remain alive, in a family context, is basically what Philippe Garrel does when he brings together, in this film, his three sons, Louis, Esther and Lena.
Plot
Three brothers run the family puppet theater together with their grandmother and father. When the latter dies, just during a show, all the others work hard to keep the activity going.