The Hedgehog (Le hérisson / herisson) (Le hérisson)

My name is Paloma.

I'm eleven.

I live at 2, Rue E. Manuel, Paris

in a rich person's apartment.

My parents are rich, my family is rich

and my sister and I are basically rich.

But, in spite of that,

in spite of all this luck and wealth,

for a long time now

I've known I'm heading for the fishbowl.

A world where adults bang like flies on the glass.

Paloma! Where are you?

Paloma?

Paloma! Where are you?

But I know one thing.

The fishbowl

isn't for me.

I've made my mind up.

At the end of the year,

the day I turn twelve,

on June 16th next,

in 165 days,

I'll kill myself.

Paloma! Where are you?

Planning to die doesn't mean

I let myself go like a rotten vegetable.

What matters isn't the fact of dying or when you die.

It's what you're doing at that precise moment.

In Taniguchi,

the heroes die while climbing Everest.

And my very own Everest

is making a film.

A film that shows why life is absurd.

The life of others and my own.

Paloma! Why do you hide like that?

If things have no meaning,

the mind must deal with that.

Paloma, your mother asked you a question.

Stop that camera.

Why do you hide, Paloma?

Right. I have to go.

Good morning, sir.

Jean-Pierre?

Jean-Pierre?

- Good morning, Mrs. Michel. - Good morning, Jean-Pierre.

Go to the hostel, it's a cold day.

Go to the hostel yourself. I prefer it here.

Mother Michel has lost her cat

Shouting from her window to get it back...

You've grown!

Solange Josse.

I'll just get you a...

Upper-class mother

with close ties, for a decade now,

to psychoanalysis, anxiolytics,

anti-depressants and champagne.

You look lovely.

I'll give you a drop but that's all.

She is vaguely aware of her plants' decorative potential,

yet obstinately talks to them like people.

That's good. You'll look fabulous.

You'll be so pretty. And even taller than me!

I'm going.

I'm going.

Have a good day, Paloma!

Good morning, Paloma.

It's freezing outside.

- Good morning, miss. - Good morning

When I got there, I saw Pierre Arthens

lying with his hand on his chest.

Dead.

He'd been there two hours.

How awful!

When the heart goes, it's radical.

We were having tea this week.

We planned dinner too...

If we'd all called today,

he'd have suspected something.

Paloma, don't stay here, please. Go home.

Mother Michel!

Jean-Pierre...

Lost your cat?

Please, not now.

Paloma, the cat!

Paloma.

In Praise of Shadows

My God, here they come.

I can hear Anna.

Such a happy family...

Spend your life like a fish in a bowl...

and end up in a body bag.

The lift!

Mrs. de Broglie, the lift's working again!

June 16th, June 15th...

May 14th, May 11th...

April 14th, April 13th...

June 16th.

In 165 days.

- Paloma's room. - Hello, young lady!

What a room!

More like Ali Baba's cave...

Coming with us?

Paul's study. He'll be here soon.

- Hi. - Hi.

No! No! no, no, no! No!

- Coming? - Just a second.

Can you prepare the tray?

Colombe Josse.

Archetype of the fish in the bowl theory.

Stop filming me!

Obsessed by the need to be less neurotic than her mother

and smarter than her father.

For her, life is a battle

in which you destroy others to win.

Paloma!

- Who's here? - Tibère's parents.

Ah, yes.

It's terrible.

Can you imagine? Poor Pierre.

How awful.

You're fine, then your heart goes

and it's all over. Can you imagine?

- It's terrible. - Terrible.

Your heart goes pop and it's over in a trice.

No, Mum, you're not crying during dinner!

It's awkward for Tibère's parents.

Did Manuela salt the tagine?

- I said not to. - You're sure?

His father has to be careful.

I salted the fruit salad.

What?

Saw you!

What did he die of?

Don't you ever listen to me?

It's funny you should say that.

When I was little,

I thought we got a number of words to say at birth

and that we'd be struck dumb once we used them up.

For me, mutes didn't get their allocation of words.

As I didn't know how many words I had,

I spoke as little as possible for ages to save them.

To get back to words,

I started therapy ten years ago

and it has changed my life.

Are you in therapy too?

I've never felt the need.

Everything's fine...

What about you? What led you to...

My father's death triggered it.

I'm convinced that taking the decision right then

was what saved me, in fact.

I remembered a dream

I had back then about losing my teeth.

They'd turn black and fall out one by one.

Do you know what my therapist said?

"Madam,

a Freudian would call it a dream of death."

Incredible, isn't it?

It's incredible.

Paul Josse.

Minister about to fall victim to a cabinet reshuffle.

A man occupied,

preoccupied and brilliant.

More focused on his career than his family but well-meaning,

despite being easily resigned.

Don't worry. The main course was enough.

I don't usually eat red meat but it was delicious!

- Are you sure? - Yes.

Thank you.

I didn't even cook it myself.

Excuse me, I'll be right back.

Paloma, I didn't give you my old camera

to fool around. Turn it off.

Sorry, an urgent call.

Lasker, the chess champion, once said,

"If there's intelligent life on Mars,

the inhabitants have invented go."

Discovered.

Discovered, invented... Lasker said it.

I see.

As I was saying, go is an extraordinary game.

It's a bit like the Japanese equivalent of chess.

Not true.

Another Japanese invention...

- Exactly. - That's not true.

The Chinese invented go, not the Japanese.

No, my dear girl, the Japanese invented go.

No, my dear sir, you're wrong.

- No... - It's not the equivalent of chess.

In chess, you kill to win.

One of the finest aspects of go

is you live to win

but also let your opponent live.

Paloma!

Life and death result from good or poor construction.

Paloma!

And what counts is good construction.

Stop pitching in.

Pursue the stars.

Don't end up as a fish in a bowl.