The Book of Wonders

The Book of Wonders (La Chambre des merveilles, 2023) is Lisa Azuelos's French drama, ready to watch online on iFILM. Thelma has a job, a home and a twelve-year-old son, Louis — until a truck hits the boy and leaves him in a coma. Alexandra Lamy plays a mother who refuses to simply sit and wait at his bedside.

In Louis's notebook she finds a list: "10 things to do before the end of the world." So she sets out to live them on his behalf, narrating every one aloud to him in the hope that her voice can reach him through the silence. The list sends her across the Shibuya crossing in Tokyo with her eyes shut, onto the pitch with his favourite football team, and into other reckless dares a woman of forty would never normally attempt. Muriel Robin co-stars as her blunt, no-nonsense mother.

Adapted from Julien Sandrel's bestselling novel, the film leans hard into sentiment, sometimes too hard — yet it stays honest about the raw fear of losing a child. It's one for viewers who don't mind a good cry and like stories where grief pushes a person outward, back into life rather than under it. Stream The Book of Wonders (2023) online on iFILM.