After giving one of the worst performances in her career in EO, Isabelle Huppert is back in full force in LA SYNDICALISTE. She plays Maureen Kearney, the workers‘ representative of a French nuclear company with 50,000 employees. When she finds out that the new boss wants to cooperate with Chinese companies on building nuclear plants, she fears the selling of trade secrets and the loss of jobs and goes on the offensive.

Tirelessly – her nice husband Gilles (Grégory Gadebois) and her adult children know this already – she researches day and night, informs the press and annoys the economic and political decision-makers. Then she is attacked in her own home. The perpetrators chain her to a chair in the laundry room, carve an “A“ on her lower stomach and stick the knife with the handle first into her vagina. After this event, the storyline takes a turn. The economic crime thriller about the twisty connections between politics and big industry under Hollande turns into a court drama that follows the shadiness the hair-raising investigation and trial: instead of investigating the perpetrator, the young commissioner who is tasked with the case questions Kearney‘s statement. She is not a believable witness in his eyes – too controlled and rational.

Isabelle Huppert plays Kearney as a lone fighter, who deprioritizes everything except for the task at hand and the facts. Her personal state and the family has to be left behind like her haircut, which is always presentable but never as perfect as her slick counterparts from the economic and political sector. At the same time, Huppert embodies a vulnerability that can only be seen in private moments and small gestures. The behavior of the law after the attack leaves her speechless.

LA SYNDICALISTE is based on the eponymous book (2019) by French investigative journalist Caroline Michel Aguirre and follows the twists and turns of the real case, which happened in 2012 and isn‘t very known in Germany. Due to this, it doesn‘t follow the classic thriller dramaturgy and all of the complexities are cleared up, yet – or perhaps because of this – LA SYNDICALISTE is exceptionally thrilling.

Hendrike Bake

Translation: Elinor Lewy