La petite Aurore l'enfant martyre

A black version of Cinderella or the story of a Cosette who would never see a Jean Valjean come to her rescue , this story is neither fairy tale nor novel:it's based on real life events and it's quite plausible, for, read the newspapers ,these awful facts are still happening today everywhere in 2020.

In its own way ,it's more terrifying than the latest horror flick ,full of special effects ; it's a low-budget film,and its treatment is almost banal ,in its stark black and white.Watch Lucie Mitchell -whose playing was so intense though restrained ,thus all the more scary- and then try to forget her:they say that the actress received death threats after the film .

If Marie -Louise can strike horror into our hearts , one can also put the blame on the father (can a person be so blind, so weak ,or is he simply a moron?) and on the priest (why didn't he send the victim to a convent , dad hinted at it in a previous scene?).Only the generous neighbor seems to realize the danger : a person with a big heart , she will imitate Victor Hugo's fishermen in "la legende des siècles ": although not rich at all, she will take in the waifs.

Maybe the actors are bad and of course the budget is very low, it was done in Québec with no money whats so ever, but it is a true story, it happened to this little girl. When her mother(Marie-Anne Caron)passed away in 1918, her father remarried and the step-mother wanted to get rid of the kids that came with that marriage, especially little Aurore because she looked like her mother. It as nothing to do with the plot summary that you give.

Aurore Gagnon passed away on February 12, 1920 at the age of 10. Her father Télésphore Gagnon married Marie-Anne Houde the step-mother from hell in 1918 and started torturing Aurore from day 1 and the excuse that was given every time something happened to Aurore was that she was clumsy. This happened in Fortierville, Québec, Canada, and the house in which all this happened is still exists.

A lot of people admits Plan Nine From Outer Space is the worst film of all time. But this 1952 French Canadian movie is just a little bit near to win the title. Acting are awful, story is very very stupid and anything's about this movie is extremely bad: film direction, sets, and music (Big old Hammond organ all the way!). In a very poor countryside of Quebec, a little girl lost her dear mother. Her father marries another woman. This woman hates the little girl. So she tortures her. She hits her with sticks, with iron, she push her in stairways, she don't feed her, she burns her hands on the stove, she made her eat soap (yes!) etc. But nobody's seem to notice, despite that the little girl look like a zombie. But at the end of the film, a neighbour seem to notice there is something strange about this kid... Then comes the priest and the holy man realise what's wrong. The bad woman is sentenced to death. But the little girl, now an angel, forgives her. Can you image worst melodrama? I can't! See this film! You will never forget it, in the same way people of today loves Plan Nine From Outer Space.

This piece of "french canadiana" is probably the most well known film of its time in Quebec. Although it was a smash hit when it came out, with the passing of time La petite Aurore l'enfant martyre basically became a twisted cult favorite among a younger and more cynical generation of film buffs. The story is a very sad one, depecting the agony of a young girl who has to cope with a violent mother-in-law. This is typically a film "so bad it's great". If you like overblown melodrama, bad acting, awful organ music and over the top moralistic endings you will definitely enjoy this movie!

It's hard for me to judge this, since it's only available in French with no subtitles, so I understood nearly none of the dialogue. But I was able to get the gist of the story, partly because it's very simple, and partly because the actors are expressive enough for me to understand the basics of what they're saying, even if I only pick up a word or two. It's actually a pretty brutal film, with some disturbing bits of child abuse that's nearly unbearable to watch at times, and a completely uncompromising and depressing ending. That said, there's some stuff to be admired here: it does a great job of setting a mood and atmosphere, with a haunting organ score, shadowy lighting, and uncomfortably close camera work; the acting is solid enough, though it's admittedly hard to tell; the story, while simplistic, is effective in evoking strong emotions. It's a dark, dreary film, but it does its job well.