This comedy-drama by first-time director and scripter Jean-Luc Trotignant details the exploits of a crass, low-life family. Achille Pinglard (Jean-Luc Bideau) is a factory foreman and his wife Ginette (Michele Brousse) works in a porno theater. Together, they are driving their daughter up the wall. She vents her feelings in her private diary, which her parents often expropriate for their own use. Meanwhile, the son in the family finds himself without a room after his parents rent it out to someone else, and the grandmother is a demented alcoholic invalid.
Plumber Martin and his younger colleague Frank are on call on Christmas Eve of all days. Frank's girlfriend Regina, who is expecting her first baby at any moment, is anything but thrilled.
Writes Viola: "Sodium Vapor was recorded over a period of several weeks in the hours between one and five in the morning on the streets of an industrial area in lower Manhattan.
Imagine a surreal narrative, without dialogue, in a style reminiscent of the 1920s silent era and seen through the lens of moving voyeuristic camera that records the odd whereabouts of an unseemly group of marginal tenants.
The weekly brass band rehearsal is an enjoyable, light-hearted occasion. Then Mathew, the conductor, introduces James, a newcomer to the village, who is an enthusiastic bandsman from the north, where they do these things properly.
Jessica's promising debut as a young artist is shattered by a sudden and violent death. She escapes into a restless succession of journeys whose encounters along the way bring humour, some comfort, but also danger.
