Oskar Rosetti | Je crie ton nom (I Scream Your Name) / 2015

escape into a future that does exist

by Douglas Messerli

 

Oskar Rosetti (screenwriter and director) Je crie ton nom (I Scream Your Name) / 2015 [26 minutes]

 

Nicholas lives in a retirement home where, when he daily looks around, everyone seems to be sleeping or near death, and the nurses come around checking up on their drugs and basically watching over the behavior.

   Nicolas (Jean Winger) is not at all dead and scrutinizes the local newspapers for gay call chatlines, when the nurses are momentarily distracted, to keep him alive in this hellhole of death in which he is entrapped.

     I know the feeling, only because I spent the most horrible week of my life in a rehabilitation facility, where the greatest joy of most of the citizens was nightly bingo, and where my roommate, who’d I grown rather fond of, chose, after suffering from a bout double-pneumonia, for a family-supported decision for euthanasia with drugs, even though it is not even legal in California, although medical aid in dying, chosen by the patient, is permitted. Trapped in the next bed, I became witness to his death, sharing with the family their sorrow and waiting out the arrival of the coroner so the body, my former friend, might be wheeled away.

     He makes the nightly calls, but the idea of golden showers and “banging” the other into eternity does not satisfy his far more romantic concerns.

      Eventually he calls the telephonic Kevin (the voice of director Oscar Rosetti), who he as obviously sought out before since he even knows the name of his supposed psychotherapist, Gabriel, Kevin suggests he simply grab his butt to see how he responds.

      And the next day in therapy, there seem plenty of moments in which he might have done so. Nicholas is suffering from pain in his right leg, yet the therapist cannot see anything wrong and wonders if it is psychosomatic, but the patient rightfully argues that isn’t going the help him walk.

    He suggests he does the proper exercises and he will be able to dance at the next party, asking him if there’s some one he prefers. The long straight look Nicholas gives Gabriel makes it clear that he himself is the focus of Nicolas’ love: “It’s not possible Nicolas! We’re not even of the same age!” He wonders if he isn’t interested in someone in the home itself.

     Nicolas’ answer if quite emphatic: Of course not, they’re just old here!”

     Yes, whether we like to think it or not, older men and women still love youth, a time that reminds them of their own beauty and possibilities. No, it is not perverse but actually quite natural. The elders remind them of their own impending death.

      Weren’t you married? the young man implores. “Emily died a few years ago.”

      Suddenly, from his window, Nicolas observes a newcomer arriving in a lovely blue convertible with his angry daughter.

      With a mud plaster on his face, and cucumbers in his eyes, Nicolas is suddenly visited by the slightly deaf Daniel (Pierre-André Sand), who stops by simply to introduce himself, bringing a small present. And immediately a rapport is established with the energetic new patient.

      In a call again to Kevin, he admits he has never felt like this before. The new fellow patient beings sudden life to Nicolas, who has felt for so long loneliness and isolation.

      “Just feeling like it’s possible…like I’m desirable again, at last!”

     They meet again with Daniel working on his car, asking about Nicolas’ cucumbers, which he explains keep his fresh. He admits he no longer has a driver’s license, but the director of the retirement home allow him to work on it from time to time. It’s a Mustang Cabriolet from 1967.

     At lunch, he discovers that one of his few sentient friends, Bridgette (Danny Rossel) has also met Daniel and enjoyed his company, with perhaps just a little jealousy.

     Later that night, as his passes a room on his first floor, Daniel, housed on the third floor, calls him in for help. He’s naked and doesn’t quite recall how he got into the situation. Evidently, soon after, Nicohlas is able to provide him with a bathrobe, and the two go wheeling down the hall together. He thanks Nicolas for his help, and he wonders what time Nicolas goes to bed. When he explains about midnight, Daniel admits he is unable to stay up that late at night—a man of my own heart.

     Yet Daniel admits that he has some really good weed, if his friend wishes to join him. Nicolas merely laughs, but Daniel takes that as a yes, and suggests they meet when the lights go out. On the roof of the residency, the two smoke, giggling a bit like young boys truly enjoying themselves, with Nicholas admitting that he scream’s his name while Daniel argues that it is actually, “I scream you name, liberty.” But that is, after all, what Daniel has suddenly come to mean for him.

     The next day the psychotherapist is encouraging Nicolas to walk, suggesting that he will become the “dancing queen” of the party, but finally he can take no more and demands him to shut up. Stop treating me as a child. “Yes, I can walk!”: “Bring me my chair, I’ve had enough of this bullshit.” Aging and the pain that comes with it cannot be dismissed by those who suffer it.

     Nicolas’ begs Gabriel’s forgiveness for having yelled at him, but there is deep suffering and depression clearly behind it.

     Finally, on the night of the party, Daniel knocks on his door and asks if he’s coming or not to the party. Nicolas, returning quickly to his wheelchair, Daniel bending to ask: “What’s wrong my friend, are we unhappy today?”

     Nicholas responds that it is nothing at all like that, Daniel arguing that for once he should find some fun in this house. Nicolas admitting, that it’s really horrible. Daniel sits down on a nearby chair and admits that he too finds it really horrible. Nicolas wonders does he have any weed left.

     And suddenly, hearing some music, Daniel stands and begins to dance, claiming that he loves the song. And suddenly he grabs up Nicolas, demanding he too dance, and as the two engage in a dance, suddenly Nicolas breaks out into a laugh not unlike his previous weed-induced giggles. He is again a young man in love.

   Without being able to control himself, Nicolas suddenly kisses his dancing partner, Daniel quickly pushing him away with total disgust. “Seriously? You’re a fag!” and he rushes out of the room, leaving poor Nicolas to try to imagine how he might redeem what has now become an impossible situation. Love is not possible at his age, particularly of the bisexual urges that Nicolas has begun to experience.

    But Daniel, in the violence, has dropped his beloved car keys. Nicolas suddenly rises and walks his way through the horrors of the resident hallways, and, keys in hand, leaves the building. Staggering outdoors, he enters Daniel’s blue Mustang Cabriolet and drives off, escaping the closed world behind him.

     This Swiss film is one of the most beautiful, stunning, and amazing coming out movies that I have ever seen. It is a true escape from everything in Nicolas’ endlessly delimiting past. It represents a desperate escape into a future that does not truly exist.

 

Los Angeles, September 5, 2026

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (September 2026).