Fanspot
Assembly of Professor Jean-Martin Charcot
“I present to you today a patient with acute symptomatic hysteria. I will therefore proceed with the hypnotic phase.”
Jean-Martin Charcot (Grégoire Bonnet)
Jean-Martin Charcot (Grégoire Bonnet) is an eminent professor specialized in nervous diseases. For his work on neurology and psychiatry, the professor hypnotizes his patients in front of an audience to show his results. This is the case for Louise (Lomane de Dietrich), a young woman who has been institutionalized for several years, serving as a guinea pig for the professor’s hypnosis experiment in front of a crowd of onlookers and other scientists.
Although in the film the guests meet in an office in La Salpêtrière, it is actually an office in the town hall of La Rochelle, more precisely the room located just behind the mayor’s.
Jean-Martin Charcot is a 19th century professor who really existed. He is the discoverer of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a neurodegenerative disease. His work on hypnosis and hysteria at the origin of La Salpêtrière inspired Janet in his studies of psychopathology and Freud in his translation of psychoanalysis.
About thirty extras were on site for the shooting of this scene at the city hall of La Rochelle.
La Rochelle town hall
Since 1298, the City Hall of La Rochelle has housed the town hall of La Rochelle in the Charente-Maritime department.
The oldest French town hall still in use, the town hall of La Rochelle is an old complex of five houses and an orchard that was used as early as 1298 by the aldermen. After multiple transformations and improvements, the building was classified as a historical monument on December 27, 1861.
In 2013, a fire broke out, damaging the building. 6 years will be necessary to restore and refurbish the interior of the unclassified part of the city hall.
The city hall of La Rochelle is composed of a Renaissance-style main building protected by a Gothic-style surrounding wall erected at the end of the 15th century.
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