Bertrand Hagenmüller, sociologist and director: "I hope that my film will be seen as a source of inspiration, to think differently about supporting Alzheimer's patients."

Residents of a nursing home are gathered in a large house to prepare a show made up of improvisational theater, poetry and music: a sensitive story of a collective adventure, Les Esprits libres takes a different look at Alzheimer's disease and neurocognitive disorders, which affect more than a million people in France. This film , released in theaters on April 30, invites us to rethink the support provided to these patients, too often reduced to their illness and their dependency. Interview with the director, sociologist Bertrand Hagenmüller.

I wanted to think about what other care options could be offered to these people, in a place where I myself would like to grow old, or see my loved ones grow old. But I needed a gateway, because I didn't want something too general. The idea for theater came because the art therapist we see in the film, Emanuela Barbone, was already conducting theater work in a nursing home in the Paris region, in collaboration with a psychologist, Kaël Lauwaert. By meeting them, watching them work, I knew I had found my gateway.

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