kviff.com
News
Festival Guide
  • Tickets and Festival Pass
  • Accommodations
  • Transportation
  • Festival cinemas
  • No Barriers project
  • Kids at the festival
  • Festival Shop
Program
  • Catalogue of films
  • Accompanying programme
  • Archive of films
  • Audience award
  • KVIFF Talks
  • Film Entry
Film Industry
  • Industry accreditation
  • Film Industry at KVIFF
  • Industry Days Programme
  • KVIFF Eastern Promises
  • KVIFF Talents
Press
  • Press accreditation
  • Press Service
  • For download
  • Press releases
  • Photogallery
  • Videogallery
About the festival
  • Festival description
  • Programme sections
  • Awards
  • History
  • We support non-profits
  • Photogallery
  • Partners
  • Why We Support the Festival
  • Contacts
CZ
Sign in
Film Archive

Outside Satan

Another View 2011 / Hors Satan / France 2011

Well-known and (for many) controversial French filmmaker Bruno Dumont has shot another of his metaphysical/spiritual films which are hard to interpret. To a certain extent, Outside Satan, screened in Un Certain Regard at this year’s Cannes festival, ties in with his debut The Life of Jesus (La vie de Jésus, 1997) through its location in the inhospitable rural environment of northern France and through vague references to its parallel with the highly enigmatic Christ figure.

Outside Satan Outside Satan

Synopsis

On the Opal Coast on the French side of the English Channel by a small village near the mouth of a river, a strange, tall man wanders. He sleeps outside, is often seen somewhere in the countryside kneeling to pray. He befriends a young woman from the village who brings him food. They walk together over the surrounding dunes covered with grass and shrubbery, along the marshes where the devil dwells, sometimes stopping to exchange a few seemingly insignificant sentences. They are clearly attached to one another without limiting either’s freedom, without there being any other bond between them. The man is so concerned about his companion that he commits a crime for her, but he is never accused of it. He evidently has healing powers, which come to light when another village woman calls him to help her daughter, who suffers from an unspecified illness. Although the unnamed man never seeks physical consolation from his unnamed companion, he is certainly not asexual. And finally we witness a miracle.

About the film

109 min / Color, 35 mm

Director Bruno Dumont / Screenplay Bruno Dumont / Dir. of Photography Yves Cape / Editor Bruno Dumont, Basile Belkhiri / Producer Jean Brehat, Rachid Bouchareb, Muriel Merlin / Production 3B Productions / Cast David Dewaele, Alexandra Lematre, Valerie Mestdagh, Sonia Barthelemy, Juliette Bacquet, Christophe Bon, Dominique Caffier, Aurore Broutin / Contact Pyramide International

About the director

Bruno Dumont

Bruno Dumont (b. 1958, Bailleul, France) has directed just four films but is nonetheless regarded as a provocative and original filmmaker. His feature debut The Life of Jesus (La vie de Jésus, 1997) won a whole series of awards, including the Caméra d’Or – Mention Spéciale at Cannes, the FIPRESCI Prize at the Chicago IFF, a Felix for European Discovery of the Year, and the Prix Jean Vigo. His subsequent films include Humanity (L’humanité, 1999 – Grand Prix at Cannes, presented in the Horizons section at KVIFF 2000), Twentynine Palms (2003), Flanders (2006 – screened in Horizons at KVIFF 2006), Hadewijch (2009). Outside Satan (2011) was screened in the Un Certain Regard  section at Cannes this year.

Contacts

Pyramide International
32 rue de l’Echiquier, 750 10, Paris
France
Phone: +33 142 960 220
Fax: +33 140 200 551
E-mail: [email protected]

Other partners
Newsletter

First-hand brews throughout the year.
Be among the first to learn about upcoming events and other news. We only send the newsletter when we have something to say.

Follow us on the web:

The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival
is part of the KVIFF Group family, which covers other projects as well:

© 2025 KVIFF GROUP

Rules for Visitors / Website visitors privacy policy / GTC / Personal Data Protection / Rules for Claim / Rules and Regulations / Contacts