MovieChat Forums > Ne te retourne pas (2009) Discussion > What about the weird moves?

What about the weird moves?


I think I almost got the whole idea of the movie. But there is still something I did not quite catch.

Since the accident, MariaRosa convinced herself that she is Jeanne, for some reason. Then, she grown up with the idea of being Jeanne. Once she has to dig up some memories of her childhood (to write her book), she starts somehow to go crazy because her brain cannot make a logical connection (and explain) between what she knows to be true (her being Jeanne and all her relatives) and the things her brain assumes to be but are not (she's supposed to look like Sophie Marceau but doesn't and so on). So one might say that Monica Bellucci integrated all the elements of her life into Sophie Marceau's life. Monica managed to make everything match, except Sophie's childhood, because this is the only part of Sophie's life that Monica did not experience as Sophie, but only as Monica in Italy. So, because Monica's brain (MariaRosa's brain) cannot gather any information about her childhood as Jeanne, the brain somehow realizes this lack of logic and starts to see things as they really are.

That is why, all of a sudden, furnitures start to move to their real places, people got their real faces, etc. The illusive curtain of her brain starts to collapse. But what is wrong with her husband and kids that start doing weird moves like they were going crazy, at the beginning of the movie???? (she's cooking at that time, and she sees them doing these moves on the camera). This really freaked me out.

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Maybe it's related to the Italian dancing moves?!

“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing”

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Maybe it was just to create more mystery like other parts. But in the last all were left unanswered.

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"This really freaked me out"

Me too. Those moments were really disturbing to me for some reason. I'd love to know how they fit into the traditional interpretation of the plot. I can't figure out what they were supposed to mean or represent. Did I miss something obvious?

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[deleted]

I had the same question.

Everything else seemed to have been explained except those movements, which really freaked me out cause I didn't know that the movie was going to have horror elements like that. Especially when I was watching the movie alone at night.

My only guess was that the director just put those movements in to have a "scare factor".

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The explanation is this is a typical French film where some detail out of the left field is left unanswered. Apparently, this does not annoy French audiences.

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I really wish director/writer would have either A) put more emphasis on the moves (since they were most exciting part of the film, for me) or B) taken them out altogether.

At least then I wouldn’t have been disappointed that they weren't touched on later in the film.

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It doesn't annoy this American viewer either. It just gives me more to ponder, and sometimes makes re-watches more rewarding.


I got girls up here do more tricks than a god damn monkey on a hundred yards of grape vine.

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I agree. I found those arm and hand movements very disturbing. Also, when the son's mole moved from one side of his neck to the other...strange. I'd love to hear an explanation of why this was done. The arm movements definitely made the whole thing seem like a conspiracy...sort of a "Gaslight" thing.

"What's that? Bag o' tricks?
No. Bag o' knives."

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[deleted]

After the big reveal (and perhaps it's a stretch since there's no real evidence), I gathered that they were supposed to be her remembering the police directing traffic after the accident (which presumably would've occured). I hadn't thought of it to be the dancing, but that's plausible.

Also, I don't think she convniced herslef she was Jeanne. The accident caused memory loss and since she was an illegtiimate child of the Italian family she was "given" to the French family, whose daughter had died in the wreck.

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The bizarre hand gestures appear to be an exaggeration and distortion of childhood memories of card players. This is made clear when Monica first meets Gianni in the cafe and spots one particular card player in the background. Notice how he deals the cards in a chopping motion. This triggers the connection and she immediately looks turns to look at Teo\Gianni.

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