The Five Devils

2022 1h 36m FR

👍

6.7

SOLID

★6.7TMDB · 236

DramaFantasyRomance

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

8-year-old Vicky has a mysterious gift: she can recreate any scent she comes across, even that of her beloved mother Joanne. When her estranged aunt Julia suddenly returns to town, the invocation of her fragrance plunges the young girl back in time to unravel a past replete with family secrets.

“Some stories are better left unspoiled.”

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Cast

Adèle Exarchopoulos
Joanne Soler
Sally Dramé
Vicky Soler
Swala Emati
Julia Soler
Moustapha Mbengue
Jimmy Soler
Daphné Patakia
Nadine
Patrick Bouchitey
Le père de Joanne
Hugo Dillon
Jeff
Antonia Buresi
La mère de famille

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Léa Mysius
Writers: Paul Guilhaume, Léa Mysius
Languages: English, Spanish, French
Countries: France

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 8

MONEY

Did you know

Shot for just $3.4M — micro-budget by Hollywood standards.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 8

MONEY

Did you know

Earned back only 1% of its budget on initial theatrical — a commercial disappointment on release.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 8

ERA

Did you know

Released 4 years ago.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 8

WORLD

Did you know

Dialogue crosses 3 languages: English, Spanish, French.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by Léa Mysius, shot by Paul Guilhaume. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Original score by Florencia Di Concilio. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

7 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Editor Marie Loustalot shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.

MoodPlayr · trivia#07

8 / 8

CAST

Did you know

Adèle Exarchopoulos and Sally Dramé and Swala Emati carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#08

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Léa Mysius directs. Paul Guilhaume behind the camera. Florencia Di Concilio scores. Marie Loustalot cuts. Runs lean at under 100 minutes. A commercial under-performer on release. Produced in France. Dialogue in English, Spanish, French.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

1Shot for just $3.4M — micro-budget by Hollywood standards.
2Earned back only 1% of its budget on initial theatrical — a commercial disappointment on release.
3Released 4 years ago.
4Dialogue crosses 3 languages: English, Spanish, French.
5Directed by Léa Mysius, shot by Paul Guilhaume. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
6Original score by Florencia Di Concilio. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
7Editor Marie Loustalot shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
8Adèle Exarchopoulos and Sally Dramé and Swala Emati carry the top of the cast.
9IMDB entry: tt13391708 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
10Classified under 8 themes, including "time travel", "lesbian relationship", "interracial relationship", "woman director".

The technical file

Cinematography: Paul Guilhaume
Original score: Florencia Di Concilio
Editing: Marie Loustalot
Production design: Esther Mysius
Costume design: Rachel Raoult
Makeup / hair: Marion Chevance
VFX supervisor: Clément Germain
Sound: Victor Praud
Runtime: 96 min · 1h 36m
Aspect ratio (typical): 1.37:1 (Academy)
Status: Released
Budget: $3,370,000
Box office: $46,666
Return: 1% of budget
Original language: FR
Certification (US): NR
IMDB: The Five Devils (2022)

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Léa Mysius

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What people are saying

CinemaSerf2023-04-01
★ 6/10
"Vicky" (Sally Dramé) lives with her school swimming coach mother "Joanne" (Adèle Exarchopoulos) and fireman father "Jimmy" (Moustapha Mbengue). Despite a fair degree of quite nasty teasing from her schoolmates, she is a happy enough child who has an astonishing gift. She has the most acute sense of smell. She can differentiate between natural and man-made scents - she can even sniff her mother out in the woods, at a distance, amongst all the other fragrances. The appearance of her aunt "Julia" (Swala Emati) causes upset though. She has just been released from prison and her arrival at their home seems to unleash in the young girl an enhanced set of powers that allows her to see into the past, as if she were a bystander, and slowly a story of lust, love and violence is revealed. It's an intriguing premiss, but somehow it just never really stays focussed long enough to become interesting. Some of the characters - especially the young Dramé are engaging enough, but the story itself is weak and underwhelming. It's not that it is boring, it isn't: it's that for too long nothing happens and then when something does, it is usually seen through the eyes of a child far too innocent to fully appreciate (I hope) what she is witness too. There is plenty of sexual fluidity here, and even a bit of tragedy at the end, but for the most part it's a jigsaw puzzle of a film with too many pieces that either don't fit or don't matter. It kills one hundred minutes easily enough, but I doubt I will ever watch it again.
badelf2024-08-15
★ 7/10
Léa Mysius has created a fascinating study here in The Five Devils. It reminds me a lot of Kubrick's horror, The Shining. Both films revolve around a protagonist that is a child gifted with the "Shining", the gift of "seeing" what others do not. The common thread is that the gift is really a metaphor for how much adults underestimate what a child sees, hears, and understands. Mysius uses magic surrealism as the vehicle for her exposition. It's quite charming and exciting. It's very well done and worth the accolades, even though I felt the script had just a few faults that took me away from complete enjoyment.