The City that ate souls away

Production

DIRECTORs: diane sara bouzgarrou & thomas jenkoe
90 minutes | FrancE, BELGIUM

In Bakersfield, California, in the heart of the Central Valley, a constellation of lives unfolds — teenagers searching for their place in a shifting world, and adults who carry the weight of choices made long ago. Their paths cross and echo one another in a landscape caught between oil fields and orchards, memory and change, isolation and possibility.
Through their words, gestures, and silences, they try to free themselves from the weight of what came before and imagine new horizons.
Our film is a choral portrait of these intertwined destinies, gradually slipping into a waking dream where what is lived and what is imagined begin to blur, as heat thickens in the air and the season drifts toward fire.

About

Production: Films de Force Majeure, Thank You & Good Night productions

Gallery

Support

Aide aux Cinémas du Monde – Centre National du Cinéma et de l’image animée – Institut Français & FAIA (writing & dev.), Eurimages, PICTANOVO (writing, dev. & prod.), Région Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur (dev. & prod.), Tax Shelter of the Belgian Federal Government in coproduction with Magellan Films, Centre du Cinéma et de l’Audiovisuel de la Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles, MEDIA Creative Europe, CICLIC (writing), PROCIREP – ANGOA

This project was selected at
Villa Albertine 2022, Pitching du Réel 2022 – Unifrance award, Eurodoc 2021

Team

Writers & directors Diane Sara Bouzgarrou & Thomas Jenkoe
Line producer Nora Bertone
Producer Jean-Laurent Csinidis, Jérôme Nunes, Geneviève De Bauw
Field producer US Kelly ParkerFixer US Fabian Vasquez EurestiEditor Théophile Gay-MazasSound editor & mixer Pierre Armand – Lemon StudioOriginal score Pierre DespratsPost-production manager BE Titouan Le Guillou1st assistant editors Clarisse Decroyer (BE), Mariona Veber Castelli (FR)Colorist Paul Millot – Cobalt Films

Technical sheet

Documentary
Format 4K
Sound 5.1, stéréo
Length 90 minutes
Languages English with french subtitles
Colour