Unfolding Trauma Through Emotional Unpredictability
Nothing Wrong (Rien de mal, 2024) is the debut feature from Canadian director Samuel Plante. The film explores a deeply complex subject with originality and restraint, initially maintaining a certain distance before gradually immersing the viewer in the emotional worlds of its characters.
Andrea is a young woman recovering from addiction. She shares a close bond with her younger sister, Claire. Claire admires Andrea and longs to be like her. When Andrea begins a relationship with Michael, things seem to stabilize—until a disturbing secret surfaces through Claire’s emails, irreversibly altering the dynamic between the sisters.
Nothing Wrong delves into the experience of trauma with precision and an unexpected perspective. While the victim of abuse is Claire—a 13-to-14-year-old girl who is groomed by the much older Michael without fully understanding the situation—the story is told through Andrea’s eyes. Andrea, too, is a victim in her own right. The trauma deepens when the sisters, following a treasure hunt (a game once shared between Michael and Andrea), discover the body of Michael, who has taken his own life.
In the early part of the film, Andrea and Claire harbor a quiet resentment toward each other, overwhelmed by their emotions and unaware of the root of their pain. After Michael’s death, their grief and anger intensify. Claire, so young and vulnerable, spirals into abandonment and bitterness, while Andrea—still emotionally attached to Michael—feels betrayed by her sister. This is where the film’s power lies: in portraying the unpredictable, often contradictory nature of human responses to trauma. Plante resists any moralizing or didactic tone, instead immersing the viewer in the emotional upheaval experienced by the two girls.
Nothing Wrong presents trauma from a refreshingly non-linear and emotionally driven perspective. Nothing unfolds as one might expect, yet everything is tightly bound to the protagonists’ emotional journey. The viewer, too, is drawn into this emotional ambiguity, sometimes siding with one sister over the other. Plante offers a free, unforced approach to storytelling, eschewing cinematic conventions that seek to teach or moralize, and instead following the characters’ raw, evolving emotional states. The cinematography reflects this: cold and distant during the film’s most devastating moments, then warm and intimate as the characters begin to process their grief.
The resolution is twofold: Claire comes to terms with what truly happened to her, and Andrea stops blaming herself, recognizing her own need for help. This shared understanding gives them the strength to reconnect and begin healing. Together, by confronting their pain and turning inward, they reclaim the deep bond that unites them.
The nature surrounding the film’s protagonists becomes both refuge and silent witness: a living backdrop where their lost consciousness slowly resurfaces. Plante gently guides the two girls through a landscape that moves from estrangement to that final embrace, almost enveloping them in its boundless, sacred immensity.
Nothing Wrong is a film that traces the reverse journey of trauma. It is a work of subtle, liberated filmmaking: sensitive enough to avoid melodrama, never exploiting pain for shock; rather, it observes and gently engages with that pain. It marks the arrival of a promising new voice in cinema, one capable of conveying emotional complexity with a clear and compassionate vision. Plante offers a delicate yet powerful perspective on the world, reminding us of the strength and fragility of the human spirit.
Andreina Di Sanzo
Edited by José Teodoro
© FIPRESCI 2025