Hon mê

This short film is about the apparent incoherence of coma. A woman in a bright red dress, figures wearing cold hospital clothes, a forest, a lake, and muted, distant voices unconnected to the image are among the contrasting elements brought together here. What may be logical to one person can seem incongruous to another. Plot elements, latency, the expectation of an event that never happens, are what drive the viewer’s interest and curiosity and make them ask questions. After a serious road accident and a long period of re-education, Laure Dasnois is determined to prove to the medical profession and, above all, to herself, that the cerebellar and hemiplegia she suffers from are not going to stop her being the dancer and performer she always was. Spectators are invited to enter, with the artist and performer, the crepuscular limbo of an incapacitated spirit; they are invited to experience the Platonic and, to say the least, regrettable, incidents experienced by the artist during her period of coma. The question of disability is subjacent here. The point is not to show a handicap as if it were some freakish object in a cabinet of curiosities. The handicap is a(n) (in)capacity but certainly not an abnormality. The handicap must not be a brake but a strength. Hon mê is a dance of survival, a battle for freedom and a successful reclaiming of beauty.