Ici Grand Est

January 26, 1945, snow falls on the war-torn Alsatian countryside. A young American lieutenant stands on the wreckage of a tank and single-handedly repels a German counterattack consisting of six tanks and more than 200 men. This extraordinary feat of arms will make him the most decorated soldier in US history. A title that would open the doors of Hollywood to him after the war, allowing him to become a popular movie star. America celebrated his triumph but remained indifferent to the invisible wounds of veterans like him.

On both sides of the Mediterranean, a battle is being fought over the preservation of Marshal Lyautey's legacy. In 1912, Marshal Lyautey became the first Resident-General of the French Protectorate in Morocco. There, he was a soldier, peacemaker, administrator, builder, urban planner, writer, and protector of the arts and monuments. A century later, the Lyautey Foundation, chaired by Claude Jamati, the marshal's great-grandnephew, is working to preserve his castle in Thorey-Lyautey near Nancy. In Morocco, the Casamémoire association is campaigning to ensure that his architectural legacy, unique in the world, is not sacrificed under pressure from property developers. Through their struggle, this film reveals the complex history of a man who left his mark on the memory of Morocco and France.

My mother ended her life on August 10, 2020. Now I have to put his things away. With what I collect in her drawers, from her entourage and in my memory, I fill, by all the means offered by the cinema, the void that she has left. A piecemeal journey made up of fragments of eras to understand this world that has become foreign to him.