New French movie The Night of the Twelfth highlights the power of obsession

Directed by Dominik Moll (Only the Animals), the new French film The Night of the Twelfth is loosely based on a tragic murder that occurred in France in 2016.
A gripping watch, this movie explores the obsessive nature of relationships and how a single murder case can dominate and take over the lives of so many people.
Walking home from a friend’s party late one night in Grenoble (a small provincial French town at the foot of the majestic French Alps), fun-loving teenager Clara (Lula Cotton Frapier) is attacked with petrol and set on fire.
On hearing the dreadful news, her mother at first refuses to believe such a thing could have happened.
But when the reality sets in, both she and her husband are steadfast and never give up on pursuing any possible information to try and identify the killer.
The homicide case is taken on by young and ambitious Captain Yohan Vivés (Bastien Bouillon) who has just been appointed group leader at the Grenoble Criminal Squad.
Along with his older and more cynical partner Marceau (Bouli Lanners) they play a ‘good cop-bad cop’ duo that leads the official investigation into Clara’s complex life and intimate relations.
The detective team interviews many male suspects and soon discovers Clara also had a wide range of male friends who were in many cases, intimate acquaintances.
The film highlights the machismo aspect of French police work and that the criminal squad is still very much a ‘man’s world’.
Another of the frustrating aspects of the film is summed up when Captain Vivés admits with sheer exasperation: “The problem is that any one of them could have done it.”
Things do however, take an interesting turn towards the end when a new female team member Nadia arrives (played by Mouna Soualem).
From a female perspective, Nadia’s presence highlights how in most murders, it is the men who are the perpetrators and the women who are the victims.
Night of the Twelfth is also a good example of the obsessive nature of the detective work (by both Vivés and Marceau), with the former taking out his frustrations by regularly riding flat out on his racing bike around the local velodrome.
In contrast, Marceau uses the case as a vehicle to vent his pent-up anger at his wife suddenly leaving him: leading to some very aggressive encounters with some of the suspects.
The Night of the Twelfth is showing at Luna Leederville and Luna on SX from Thursday October 13, 2022.

By Mike Peeters
Mike Peeters Media