Vincent Lindon, Galatéa Bellugi, Patrick d’Assumçao
Starring awarded French household name Vincent Lindon (The Measure of a Man), Xavier Giannoli’s The Apparition is a story of a reporter investigating a young French woman who claims to have seen the Virgin Mary. Combining a mystery plot involving the Catholic church with the continent-hopping story of a traumatised war journalist seeking the truth, the result is an intriguing and suspenseful drama; and one of the strongest selling films out of France in early 2018.
Having just returned back to France from a war zone, Jacques (Lindon) is contacted by a French cardinal at the Vatican, who invites him to Rome for a special mission. A young girl named Anna (Galatea Bellugi) claims to have seen an apparition of the Virgin Mary outside her village in southern France, making the place now a pilgrimage site for worshippers. The Vatican wants Jacques to investigate and determine what’s the truth behind her story.
Lindon fitfully portrays an emotionally wounded man who obsesses over the mysterious investigation as a way to forget his own turmoil; while Giannoli’s firm grasp on intimate yet epic storytelling keeps the viewer on their toes until the very end.
