Kumu Documentary: The Great Arch
L’Inconnu de la Grande Arche
Dir Stéphane Demoustier
Cast: Claes Bang, Sidse Babett Knudsen, Xavier Dolan, Swann Arlaud, Michel Fau
France 2025, 104 min
In French and Danish, with Estonian, Russian and English subtitles
Unknown Danish architect Johan Otto von Spreckelsen (Claes Bang) wins François Mitterrand’s competition for a new monument at La Défense. The true story of an idealistic architect entangled in a web of political intrigue.
French President François Mitterrand launches an international architectural competition for the flagship project of his career. Against all odds, Otto von Spreckelsen, an unknown Danish architect, wins the competition with La Grande Arche, aligned with the Louvre and the Arc de Triomphe.
While the architect intends to build the Great Arch exactly as he envisioned, his ideas quickly clash with realistic constraints and the vicissitudes of politics.
Director Stéphane Demoustier’s elegant film is based on Laurence Cossé’s book of the same name, and tells the true story of Von Spreckelsen without too much melodrama and with attention to detail. The Great Arch is Demoustier’s fourth feature film. The previous one, The Girl with a Bracelet, presented at the 2019 Locarno Film Festival, won the Cesar for Best Adapted Screenplay. In 2023 he directed Borgo, which won Hafsia Herzi the Cesar for Best Actress.
Claes Bang is a critically acclaimed actor, trained at the National Theatre School in Copenhagen, with a renowned career rooted in Danish theatre and cinema. He first gained international recognition as the lead in the Swedish production The Square, which won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 2017 and earned nominations at both the Golden Globes and the Academy Awards in 2018.
Claes made history as the first Danish actor to win the Best Actor Award at the European Film Awards.
Distributer Bestfilm.
