Duchemin is no stranger to these kinds of stories. With En bataille, her 2018 documentary about a prison director, she had already shown her ability to get to the heart of things – a work that earned her the Magritte for Best Documentary. Here, she does it again, but with an even more intimate and direct narrative.
Mariem is 53 years old, with a past that now feels like it belonged to someone else. She once sold luxury homes in Namur, lived in a beautiful villa, but behind the facade was the violence of an abusive partner. One night she takes everything – or rather, almost nothing – and leaves. She ends up in a shelter for homeless women, and from there begins the long and complicated road to rebuild her life.
This is not a film that chases drama at all costs. On the contrary, it finds its strength in the everyday details: the endless paperwork, the infantilizing bureaucracy, the constant feeling of not belonging anywhere. Mariem moves through all this with dignity and a disarming clarity. Her only link to the outside world is her phone. Her children don’t know anything. The bank is demanding. The documents are gone. But she holds on. And in the meantime, she tries to figure out who she has become.
At a certain point, the director herself enters the film. Not in an intrusive way, but gently. Her voice, her presence, become part of the story. A sincere bond forms between her and Mariem, and you can feel it. The film becomes almost a two-way conversation, intimate, full of solidarity. And we, the viewers, are there, in the middle, watching – and inevitably – rooting for her.
What’s striking is the simplicity with which everything is told. There are no plot twists or big revelations. Just reality, raw and true. And yet, it never gets boring. On the contrary, it holds you, because Mariem is one of those people you’d really want to meet. A woman who, even in the middle of chaos, manages to find meaning, a foothold, a strength that’s all her own.
Duchemin delivers a powerful portrait, made up of small things: an iron, a nutcracker, a few objects rescued from the past that become symbols of resistance. But above all, she builds a film that speaks of sisterhood, of solidarity among women, of how fragile and precious the very concept of “home” is.
Petit Rempart doesn’t take you by the hand. It throws you into an uncomfortable reality, makes you feel the smell of the rooms, the weight of waiting, the loneliness of the corridors. But it does so with respect, never stealing space from the voice of those who live that reality every day. And in the end, when the film is over, you’re left with a simple but unsettling question: “What if it happened to me?”
Mariem doesn’t ask for pity. She asks to be seen. And Petit Rempart truly sees her.
