Review: A Restless Spirit Haunts a Family in ‘A Season in France’

A plaintive spirit hovers over “A Season in France,” the latest feature by Mahamat-Saleh Haroun (“A Screaming Man”), about a refugee family from the Central African Republic living in Paris. The film opens on a forested area with distant gunshots. This gloomy image is punctuated by a woman’s heart-wrenching cry that startles Abbas (Eriq Ebouaney) awake.

Then, a statuesque woman with a beautiful Afro appears in the hallway, a smile on her face; she disappears as Abbas moves toward her. It’s possible she is a ghost, or a figment of his imagination. His young daughter, Asma (Aalayna Lys), is also roused from sleep, and tells of having dreamed of her deceased mother.

“I miss her, too,” Abbas assures Asma. He comforts her with her mother’s lullaby, but a third disembodied voice — a woman’s — joins in. They look as if they can hear this woman, Abbas’ eyes searching for the source, to no avail. The instance is touching and chilling, like much of “A Season in France.”

Haroun lives in these quiet, understated moments throughout, be it a tense scene between lovers who have drifted apart or a cheerful birthday dinner celebration. And while the story plays a bit with the notion of the supernatural, the spirit foregrounded here is more tangible: an ominous sense of restlessness and curtailed dreams.

Back home, Abbas was a high school French teacher; now in Paris, anxiously awaiting political asylum, he works at a food market. Asma and her brother, Yacine (Ibrahim Burama Darboe), have difficulty adjusting, as the family is forced to move frequently. Étienne (Bibi Tanga), Abbas’ brother, struggles with feelings of inadequacy, having gone from being a philosophy professor to a pharmacy security guard.

Thankfully there are episodes of reprieve, like an impromptu pillow fight between Abbas and his children. And there is Abbas’ romantic partner, Carole (Sandrine Bonnaire), a warm Frenchwoman whom the children adore. Her love for Abbas is unfailing, yet his uncertain future and the lingering pain from the loss of his wife prevent him from being able to fully commit to Carole emotionally.

As Abbas, Ebouaney anchors this delicate balancing act between optimism and dread, embodying vulnerability while trying to remain hopeful and authoritative in front of Asma and Yacine. The children, for their part, occasionally launch bitter admonishments at their father: “You said you knew people in France who would welcome us,” Yacine complains. “You lied to us,” adds Asma, in that blunt, uninhibited way children speak when hurting.

The film builds toward an explicit condemnation of Europe’s handling of the refugee crisis, encouraging the viewer’s fury at the family’s forced circumstances. But it doesn’t need this. Haroun has already so carefully demonstrated, through wordless scenes and intimate world building, a heartbreaking sadness that haunts long after the movie ends.

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‘A Season in France’

Not rated. In French, with English subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 40 minutes.