The heart of the film is the nursing home – and Hamaguchi filmed in an actual EHPAD (établissement d’hébergement pour personnes âgées dépendantes) in the suburbs of Paris. The production did not build a set. They moved in. The crew lived at the care home during the shoot, eating with the staff, walking the corridors, learning the rhythms. Some residents appeared as extras. Others simply watched. The specific street address and internal name of the private nursing home have not been publicly disclosed by the production team – deliberately, to protect the privacy of the facility and its residents.
Cinematographer Alan Guichaoua shot the facility without sentimentality. One reviewer noted: “This is not Paris as a touristy spectacle but rather Paris as periphery: corridor light, kitchen routines, tired gardens.” The nursing home in the film is called Le Jardin de la Liberté – The Garden of Freedom – but the real location provides everything.
Much of the film’s middle section follows Marie-Lou and Mari on a nighttime walk through the Parisian streets – a Hamaguchi signature, two people talking while moving through a city. During this walk Mari reveals her diagnosis.
