STORY OF WOMEN

In this provocative drama based on the story of one of the last women guillotined in France, Claude Chabrol focuses on common people trying to survive during the Occupation. Marie (Isabelle Huppert) is a poor, uneducated wife and the mother of two very young children. Her husband has been disabled in early WWII fighting, leaving her to be the sole support of her family. By performing abortions, Marie is able to afford decent food and a small apartment. She also takes a lover, whose collaboration with the Germans provides her a few more luxuries. But Marie's new happiness is cut short when she is denounced by the state and arrested as a threat to the “moral restoration” of a defeated French nation. Huppert's tour de force performance superbly conveys every nuance of her complex character's emotions.