L'Adieu aux anges
Laurence Serfaty
2000 - 26 min - Betacam SP - Couleur - France

A birth is, at first sight, a source of happiness...
But it can become terribly complex if it is death that comes along, and not life.
Miscarriages, medical terminations of pregnancy, still-born children : these early misfortunes generally leave the parents to their grief, their loneliness and often also their feeling of guilt. This happens especially if the parents do not know what has happened to the body of their child, if they can keep no trace of it.
These brutal mechanics of nature and the administration have not yet had the benefit of a public debate. It is still a kind of taboo. But some doctors, some midwives, or other carers consider that it is essential that parents, even if it is painful, should see their children, that they should give them a name and be able to mourn them, so that the "unborn" becomes part of the family history.
In the regional hospital in Lille, a department has been running for several years so that parents are no longer alone with their despair, and so that they may ritualise the death of their child, if they wish.
This film shows the psychological effectiveness of this way of accompanying people, with parents who absolutely wanted their child.