Writers: Gilles Marchand and Dominik Moll
Director: Dominik Moll
Based on true events, the otherwise fictional Case 137 is set at the time of the Yellow Vests Protests in France in 2018. Each week, thousands of protestors would gather to call for President Macron’s resignation in a country divided by social and economic inequality. When the protests became violent, police from all divisions were called in to keep the peace and ‘save the Republic’. However, the police, using tear gas and riot guns, were often heavy-handed in their approach.
Léa Drucker plays Inspector Stéphanie Bertrand at the IGPN, investigating the crimes of police officers. Her team is busy during the Yellow Vest protests, where many officers are accused of acts of disproportionate violence, but when she’s given a case involving a young man who has been shot at by police, Stéphanie is determined to find out the truth.
Guillaume Girard has been hit in the head by a riot gun bullet and is hospital with multiple injuries to his cranium. His friend, who was with him at the time of the incident, attests that the attack by the policemen was completely unprovoked. Although wearing yellow jackets, the two young men were not taking part in any of the violence that broke out in the capital in December 2018.
With so much chaos on the streets, it takes time for Stéphanie and her team to track down the policemen, all looking similar in helmets and black clothes, responsible for the shooting. And when she does find them, they all testify that they know nothing and that they were merely doing their job and maintaining order. It appears that her investigation will go no further until she looks once more at blurry mobile phone footage, and she realises that there is a witness to the attack.
The interviews are thrilling to watch, and there’s a strange discomfort watching Stéphanie overstep her duties as she stalks the potential witness through the Métro. Drucker is excellent as the investigator, never tiring in her pursuit to find out what really happened on that December night. Stéphanie is given enough of a backstory – a policeman as an ex-husband, a son who doesn’t understand why everyone hates the police and a rescued cat named Yoghurt – for her to be a fully fleshed out character, rather than a cypher for justice.
However, the film is fairly formulaic – we have seen plenty of movies and TV series with similar narratives – and director Dominik Moll, known for The Night of the 12th, brings little new to the table. Case 137 begins with presumably real footage of the protests themselves. The shots are colourful, vibrant and urgent; features that are missing in the rest of Moll’s workaday, but important, film.
Case 137 is screening at the French Film Festival 2025.
