10 Outstanding French Films You've Probably Never Heard Of

2. Hadewijch (2009) - Bruno Dumont

Here we arrive to Bruno Dumont's most accomplished work so far, one of the most thoughtful and poignant quests for happiness ever filmed. Hadewijch is a novice Sister whose excessive fervor gets her expelled from her abbey. Readopting her birth name of Céline, she goes back to Paris to live with her wealthy parents. Lonely, dissatisfied and €“ it is very subtly suggested €“ possibly sexually abused by her father, Céline eventually meets a group of Muslim youths. Despite their religious differences, the men are impressed by her piety, particularly by her insistence on remaining a virgin out of fidelity to Jesus. The group is eventually indoctrinated into terrorism. Without converting to Islam, Céline joins them willingly, even prays alongside them, right until the day of the attack. While this might sound like a simple-minded attempt to put Islamic fundamentalism and Christian fundamentalism on the same moral level, Hadewijch is much smarter than that. As the Mother Superior observes early in the film, Céline's faith is more about herself than any external deity and set of rules. Unlike most Islamic terrorists, her actions are not driven by subscription to a specific ideology but rather a craving for meaning and completion within herself.