Features: DVD, Dolby, Digital Audio
Based on scandalous true events, the brilliantly acted Sister My Sister is a darkly disturbing tale of madness, forbidden passion and murder set in a small French provincial town in 1932. Joely Richardson (TV's Nip/Tuck) and Jodhi May (The Last of the Mohicans) star as Christine and Lea, emotionally fragile sisters employed as maids for Madame Danzard and her plain, frumpy daughter. Oscar-nominee Julie Walters (Educated Rita, Calendar Girls) gives a tour-de-force performance as the tyrannical Danzard, whose cruelty will compel an increasingly desperate bond between the sisters, resulting in a tragic and shocking crime.
"...a subtle, slightly campy chamber drama with a quartet of fine performances." Edward Gutthman, San Francisco Chronicle
Editor's Note
SISTER MY SISTER reprises the real-life story of the Papin sisters, two working-class chambermaids who murdered their bourgeois employers and scandalized 1930s French society. Joely Richardson turns in a powerful performance as older sister Christine, who is employed with sibling Lea (Jodhi May) in the claustrophobic home of repressive dowager Madame Danzard (Julie Walters) and her unhappy daughter Isabelle (Sophie Thursfield). Isolated from society and mistreated by the Danzards, the sisters spiral into madness and obsession as their affection for each other blossoms into an incestuous relationship. For variations on the same story, see MURDEROUS MAIDS or Claude Chabrol's LA CEREMONIE.
Plot Summary
An eerie psychological drama based on the true story of two sisters, Christine and Lea, who were maids in a provincial French town in 1932 and gained fame when they brutally murdered their cruel employers. | Christine and Lea live and work in the house of Madame Danzard, a widow and the domineering mother of young Isabelle. The sisters have minimal contact with the outside world, no social life, and are continually berated and badgered by Madame. In this hothouse atmosphere, Christine and Lea develop an incestuous relationship. The tension between upstairs and downstairs comes to a head one day when the sisters, having blown an electrical fuse, murder Madame and Isabelle so as not to be chastised, once again.
|
