Niki (2024)

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The debut feature of actor-turned-director Céline Sallette, Niki is a vibrant portrait of French-American artist Niki de Saint Phalle (Charlotte Le Bon), one of the most iconoclastic figures of the contemporary art world. Fleeing the oppressive atmosphere of post-war America, Niki arrives in Paris in 1952 with her husband Harry (John Robinson) ready to leave the past behind. But as she embarks on her new bohemian life in Paris, she is haunted by flashbacks and lingering childhood trauma that pushes her towards mental illness. When this culminates in being institutionalized, she turns to art as a means of survival. Emerging from darkness with a fierce creative drive, she enters the avant-garde art scene of Montparnasse. Blending emotional intimacy with striking visual invention, Niki offers a vivid look at the making of an icon-an artist who defied convention and transformed deep psychological wounds into creativity and artistic reinvention.