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Yolande Moreau as Séraphine

Yolande Moreau and Ulrich Tukur

Yolande Moreau as Séraphine

Yolande Moreau as Séraphine

Yolande Moreau as Séraphine

Séraphine

directed by Martin Provost
starring Yolande Moreau, Ulrich Tukur, Anne Bennent

Séraphine is the true story of Séraphine Louis aka Séraphine de Senlis (Yolande Moreau), a simple and profoundly devout housekeeper who in 1905 at age 41 — self-taught and with the instigation of her guardian angel — began painting brilliantly colorful canvases.

In 1912 Wilhelm Uhde (Ulrich Tukur), a German art critic and collector — he was one of the first collectors of Picasso and champion of naïve primitive painter Le Douanier Rousseau — discovered her paintings while she worked for him as a maid in his lodgings in Senlis outside Paris. Uhde became her patron and grouped her work with other naïve painters – the so-called “Sacred Heart Painters” — with acclaimed shows in Paris, elsewhere in Europe and eventually at New York’s MOMA.

Director Martin Provost builds his story around the relationship between the avant-garde art dealer and the visionary cleaning lady, forging a testament to the mysteries of creativity and the resilience of one woman’s spirit.

A sleeper hit in France, Séraphine went on to a surprise win of the Best Picture and Best Actress for Yolande Moreau along with five other awards at the 2009 Cesars, the French equivalent of the Academy Awards.

Awards

Seven Césars (France’s equivalent of the Academy Award)
Audience Award at 2009 Scottsdale Film Festival
Best Foreign Film of 2009 – Women Film Critics Circle
Best Actress of 2009, Yolande Moreau – LA Film Critics

Press Reactions

Exceptional…refuses to capitulate to the ordinary and the expected…the long French tradition of thoughtful, intelligent films of quality for adults is alive and well here, and that is reason to rejoice. – Kenneth Turan, ??Los Angeles Times??
A superior film…almost biblical in its simplicity and passion. – Stanley Kauffman, ??New Republic??
The best movie made about a painter since Maurice Pialat’s exquisite Van Gogh in 1991 — and one of the only ones that truly grasps how close artistic genius dwells to the realm of madness. – Scott Foundas, ??Los Angeles Weekly??
Unusually fine and insightful – AO Scott, ??The New York Times??
One of the loveliest and most sombre fables of a lonely artist’s ecstasy. – The New Yorker
Sublime… one of the most evocative films about an artist I’ve ever seen. – New York Magazine
If you turn off all that electronic crap in your pockets and sit still for it, “Séraphine” will be one of the year’s most memorable moviegoing experiences. – Andrew O'Hehir, ??Slate??
4 STARS! Miraculous. – Roger Ebert, ??Chicago Sun-Times??