Detention

synopsis

This prison procedural completes the trilogy of films including Savage Flowers (2017) and In the Open (2017). This time, the director follows the jailers rather than the prisoners. Moving into student accommodation for six months, he films classes at France’s national prison service academy, seeking to enter the minds of hesitant students as they become instruments of power. This fascinating observational film presents prison as an ethical and philosophical problem. Through the collective protagonist of the student body, it reflects an entire institution that teaches both the rules for handling human material and ways to circumvent them. The problem with prison lies not in bad guards, but in the very nature of prison itself.

 

“Everybody who is in a position to have some power is able to abuse it.” — Montesquieu, quoted by one of the film’s protagonists

biography

Guillaume Massart (1983) is a French director, editor and producer who studied filmmaking at La Fémis in Paris. His work explores marginalised communities, human rights and environmental issues. His films include Voices of the Forgotten (2010) about village inhabitants; Echoes of War (2013) about war veterans; and Shadows of the Past (2016) about Holocaust survivors.

film details

director:	Guillaume Massart
producer:	Céline Loiseau, Guillaume Massart
script:	Guillaume Massart, Simon Kansara
editing:	Théophile Gay-Mazas
sound:	Pierre Bompy, Manuel Vidal, Nathalie Vidal