The Chambermaid on the Titanic

Horty is a foundry worker in France. He wins a competition his works has organised and is sent to England as the prize, to watch the Titanic's first sailing. At the hotel a woman called Marie knocks at his door: she says she is a chambermaid on the ship and cannot find anywhere to stay. They spend the night in the same room without touching each other. By morning she is gone. Horty goes home with nothing but a photograph. Back in his town he starts telling the story of that night, and it grows with every telling. The tavern fills up, then halls fill up; by recounting something he never lived through, the man turns into a show. Bigas Luna's film uses the Titanic as scenery; its real subject is how a lie works better than the truth. The source is Didier Decoin's novel. Olivier Martinez plays Horty and Aitana Sánchez-Gijón plays Marie. A hundred minutes.