General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Lourdes (2009 film)

Lourdes is a 2009 drama film directed by the Austrian filmmaker Jessica Hausner, an Austria, France, and Germany co-production about a wheelchair-using woman on a pilgrimage to the French shrine town of Lourdes who is unexpectedly healed. It premiered in competition at the Venice Film Festival in September 2009, where it won the FIPRESCI Prize, and it went on to collect awards at festivals in Warsaw and Seville.¹^•²

Key fact	Detail
Director and writer	Jessica Hausner, her third feature film³
Production	Austria, France, Germany, 2009; produced by coop99 Filmproduktion with Essential Filmproduktion, Thermidor Filmproduktion, and Société Parisienne de Production⁴
Premise	Christine, almost completely paralyzed by multiple sclerosis, joins a church pilgrimage to Lourdes as a non-believer and suddenly walks again⁴
Principal cast	Sylvie Testud (Christine), Léa Seydoux, Gilette Barbier, Gerhard Liebmann, Bruno Todeschini, Elina Löwensohn⁴
Format and language	35 mm, color, French-language dialogue; running time reported as 96, 98, 99, or 100 minutes depending on the source³^•⁵
Key crew	Cinematography Martin Gschlacht, editing Karina Ressler, production design Katharina Wöppermann, costumes Tanja Hausner⁴
Major awards	FIPRESCI Prize and Brian Award at Venice 2009; Warsaw Grand Prix; Gold Giraldillo for Best Film at Seville¹^•²

Spoilers

Plot and subject

Christine, played by Sylvie Testud, suffers from multiple sclerosis that has left her almost completely paralyzed and dependent on a wheelchair. Although she does not believe in miracles, she joins a pilgrimage organized by a lay religious order to the shrine at Lourdes, both in search of a cure and to escape her isolation; piety buys her the trip and the social contact she craves.⁴^•⁶ She is cared for by the young volunteer Maria (Léa Seydoux) and, increasingly, by the older and lonelier Frau Hartl (Gilette Barbier), who prays fervently for her.⁷

During the stay, Christine's condition improves so dramatically that she can walk again. The film leaves open whether this is a genuine miracle, a temporary remission, or something in between, and it ends with doubts about how long the healing will last.⁴^•⁷ The healing also changes the social dynamics around her: other, more pious pilgrims question their own purpose, and envy and gossip arise in the wake of what looks like a miracle.⁶^•⁸

Approach and production

A detached observer. Hausner, who describes herself as a probable atheist who sometimes weakens into agnosticism, made the film as a record of the pilgrimage world rather than an argument for or against faith. She has said she wanted neither to give Catholic answers to the problems of faith nor to mock the devotion of sick pilgrims.⁹ Reviewers noted the resulting tone: the International Film Festival Rotterdam program described a film that never turns into real satire or melodrama but remains a subtle study of hope, faith, and the whims of life.³

Hausner chose Lourdes deliberately as the setting for a film about miracles, after research into where such a story should take place. Gaining access to the sanctuary took time: she visited several times during location scouting, and after about a year of discussions with the sanctuary authorities, including conversations with Monseigneur Perrier, Bishop of Tarbes and Lourdes, filming permission was granted. She found that the Catholic dignitaries themselves were conscious of the ambivalence of miracles, doubting whether a cure is true and lasting or a coincidence before a relapse.¹⁰^•¹¹

The film was shot on 35 mm in Vienna and Lourdes between April and June 2008, with funding from the Austrian Film Institute, Filmfonds Wien, Eurimages, Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, Filmstiftung Nordrhein Westfalen, and the Midi-Pyrénées regional fund, among others. It was Hausner's first feature made in French, a choice she made to look at the milieu with a distanced, outsider's gaze.²^•¹⁰

Release and reception

Lourdes premiered at the Venice Film Festival in September 2009, selected in competition. It won four prizes in Venice, among them the FIPRESCI Prize, the La Navicella Venice Cinema Award from a Catholic jury, and the Brian Award from an atheist group, a pairing that mirrors the film's deliberate ambiguity.¹^•²^•³ Later honors included the Warsaw Grand Prix, the Gold Giraldillo for Best Film at Seville, the 2010 promotion prize of the DEFA Foundation at Saarbrücken, and the Thomas-Pluch screenplay prize.²

The film opened in Austrian cinemas on 11 December 2009, distributed by Stadtkino Filmverleih, and in Germany on 1 April 2010.²^•¹² Critics responded warmly. In The Guardian, Peter Bradshaw called the drama subtle, mysterious, and brilliant, rating it four out of five, and his colleague Philip French described it as a gem made by a former assistant to Michael Haneke.¹³ The German Film and Media Rating board (FBW) praised its precisely staged view of pilgrimage tourism and its elaborate color design.¹² Writing in Medical Humanities, the disability researcher Tom Shakespeare found the film subtle and ambiguous, noting that the protagonist remains passive for almost the entire story while the camera records the pilgrims, the services, and the queueing at the shrine.¹⁴

The director

Jessica Hausner was born in Vienna in 1972 and studied directing at the Film Academy of Vienna, where she made the award-winning shorts Flora (1996) and Interview (1999). Her debut feature Lovely Rita premiered in Un Certain Regard at Cannes in 2001, followed by Hotel there in 2004. Lourdes was her third feature; she later made Amour Fou (2014), Little Joe (2019), and Club Zero (2023).¹⁵

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026