Dir: Micha Wald | Cast: Salome Dewaels, Alexandra Lamy, Louis Peres, Candice Bouchet | Belgium, Drama 102′
A Survivor’s Tale is an incredible 16th story of female courage and survival that still feels relevant today with its feminist credentials.
Loosely based on real events, the story mainly takes place in Canada but the craggy rocks and blonde beaches of Britanny serve as a magnetic setting for a dour historical costume drama that sees a young woman condemned to a grim death after being raped by a wicked nobleman.
A Survivor’s Tale is the second feature of Belgium’s award-winning Micha Wald who book-ends the narrative with scenes in a castle, where, in 1541, we first meet Marguerite de la Rocque Roberval on her return to France from exile, recounting her story to Marguerite of Navarre (1492-1549) who vows to save her from death at the stake, ordered by her brother King Francis I, and goes on to chronicle the tale in her collection of short stories ‘The Heptameron’.
Salome Dewaels gives a remarkable performance as Marguerite describing how she was banished to the desolate ‘Ile de Demons’, en route to the New World, when her elderly guardian and husband-to-be, the Viceroy of Canada, discovers her pregnancy by the knight-errant Thomas d’Artois (Louis Peres).
Stranded on the hostile island with the evil Thomas, who continues to pose a threat with violent beatings and efforts to overcome her, and the useless maidservant Damienne (Candice Bouchet) Marguerite is left to freeze to death with only a few belongings. Thomas’ vain attempts to find food and shelter come to nothing so the young woman must endure cold and sickness with only her maid for comfort. Damienne sees life through the prism of her strict Catholic beliefs and this unhelpful blind faith renders Marguerite all the more depressed and vulnerable. The servant repeatedly urges her to marry the pathetic father of her unborn child who she tries to abort several times after giving birth.
Obviously Marguerite does survive against the odds and lives to describe her experience of male brutality at a time where strong, independently-minded women were considered witches if they achieved something special, or tried to rise above the male hierarchy. Beautiful but brutally depicted with some fabulous widescreen camerawork by Joachim Philippe.
ROTTERDAM INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 2026 | HARBOUR STRAND