Man at Bath

Omar is on the verge of leaving Gennevilliers for a New York City tour to showcase his latest collaborations. He frames the trip as both a professional opportunity and a chance to escape the weight of recent events. This decision marks a shift toward independence and a new chapter in his life.

Emmanuel commits a violent act that amounts to rape. In the wake of this, Omar asks Emmanuel to pack and leave before his departure. The couple drifts apart as Omar mourns the end of their relationship.

With the relationship over, Omar follows memory, desire, and artistic impulse as he uses the NYC trip as a chance to escape. He treats his itinerary as a moving study rather than reconciliation. The camera's gaze becomes a tool to map mourning.

Omar’s camera fixates on Dustin, a young Canadian on vacation, and their first encounters become a filmed inquiry into attraction and power. The interactions evolve into an intimate dynamic openly documented on screen. The project broadens beyond a single liaison toward a broader bisexual arc.

The narrative introduces Omar’s former teacher figure and explores how boundaries blur when art and life collide. The documentary style probes how Omar depicts sex and desire within an intellectual frame. These threads complicate the line between observer and participant.

Back home in Paris, Emmanuel arrives emotionally adrift and financially strained. He takes shelter in Omar’s apartment and tries to reinvent himself, seeking the old confidence he once had in the public eye. The space becomes a stage for his desire and instability.

Emmanuel navigates encounters with Omar’s circle, including an upstairs neighbor who also acts as a sex-work client. He even brings Omar’s look-alike into the apartment, creating a tense, memory-laden dynamic. The room becomes claustrophobic as need, memory, and power clash.

There is an intermission where Emmanuel confronts his own emotional fragility, undermining his bravado. The moment exposes vulnerability beneath his performative toughness. The tension threads through the apartment’s walls.

Emmanuel refuses the advances of an underage boy, Andréas Leflamand, highlighting moral lines he guards and breaches. Later, he accepts a tip from a former close friend, underscoring the ethical ambiguities surrounding everyone’s actions. The sequence deepens the sense of moral turbulence in the apartment.

The narrative introduces Rabah Zahi, a teenager who pursues Emmanuel, who responds with harsh cruelty. This moment stands out for its intensity and the claustrophobic atmosphere of the apartment. It marks one of the film’s most painful episodes.

Over days, Emmanuel’s emotional volatility peaks, and he cries in front of a mural he begins painting on the apartment wall. The mural becomes a private, improvised form of emotional work. It signals a subdued, redemptive moment amid emotional wreckage.

Omar returns to Paris and stops to consider the finished mural and Emmanuel’s absence in the shared space. The moment is calm but loaded with unresolved longing. It hints that the past lingers in rooms, walls, and the camera’s gaze.

The film closes with a sense that departure and return are ongoing negotiations between art, memory, and need. The mood remains measured, observant, and open-ended, leaving questions about reconciliation and memory. The cityscapes frame the lingering ache.