Feature, documentary and family film about and with the phenomenon Serge Reggiani with and by his son Simon. Great intimacy and authenticity make the film both very original and extremely moving.Alcoholism has left the famous 70-year-old actor and singer Serge Reggiani in a terrible state. He is mentally unstable, very melancholy and haunted by old traumas. He acted the role of Frantz Gerlach in the play Séquestrés d’Altona by Sartre in the sixties for so long and so intensively that he became schizophre¡nic; his own personality became interwoven with that of Frantz. Serge shuts himself off from the world and only wants to see his son Simon. The film reports on these encounters, but is also an instrument used by the son to free his father from his lethargy.Simon starts an investigation into his father’s background and visits him in hospital where he is being nursed because alcohol has attacked his whole body. He doesn’t seem to have long to live. Simon suggests to the doctors that his father should be made to share his room with others (‘de force avec d’autres’) to break down his isolation. The enforced contact with other, often much younger, alcoholics helps Serge over his fear and he opens up to others. In the end he even manages to recover enough to perform in the famous Paris venue Olympia.
