The surprises just keep coming in The Origin of Evil, a family drama that morphs into a psychological thriller. Laure Calamy plays a blue collar woman in her forties who is finally ready to meet the father who has never been in her life. She finds a man (Jacques Weber) of immense wealth, who has had a stroke and is fighting his wife and (other) daughter’s attempts to take control of his estate in conservatorship. He takes to her, although the rest of the family is hostile, and we think we’re watching a dad-daughter reunification story. She tells a lie about her job, which is just the first domino in a series of revelations about who these people are, and how evil and/or unhealthy they may be.
It’s not long before we think we’re watching a story in which all the people are terrible; but then we see that, while all may be behaving very badly, some may be angry, some damaged, some unhinged, and at least one is evil. Perhaps the biggest reveal is about how long one character has known about another’s fraud. Two other big plot twists come at the end.
This is a fantastic and highly original story. Director Sébastien Marnier wrote the screenplay in collaboration with Fanny Burdino
Laure Calamy is brilliant as the protagonist, a shifting character whom we are always trying to figure out and to guess what she’s going to do next. The Origin of Evil is a dramatic showcase for Calamy, who is one of my favorite international comic actresses (Sibyl, My Donkey My Lover and I, My Best Part, Only the Animals).
Jacques Weber is excellent as the patriarch. The rest of the cast (Dominique Blanc, Doria Tillier, Suzanne Clément,Celeste Brunnquell, Veronique Ruggie) is solid.
The Origin of Evil can be streamed from Amazon and AppleTV.