Polisse

Directed by Maïwenn, Polisse tells the story of a police juvenile protection unit, the men and women who serve in the unit, the cases they investigate and the toll that their job’s demands of them, both personally and professionally. Polisse doesn’t follow the usual format for films like this, where a crime is committed and the police work hard to solve the case and bring the bad guy to justice. It doesn’t event really use that framework as a springboard to take the story in a new direction, like having the cops find the bad guy only to show them delivering their own brand of justice. Instead, Polisse gives us a multi-layered, almost impressionistic vision of what being immersed in the lives of these police officers must be like. So instead of exposition, we hear snippets of conversation between the officers, in a group or in pairs, which may or may not lead us someplace important (at least in terms of the plot). We witness interrogations, amazed at how horrified we are at what we hear, but only see in our imaginations. We feel frustrated at never finding out what ultimately happens to the people being interrogated, forced to feel as overwhelmed as the police as another, more horrible case takes its place.