The Machine

The Machine

1994 · 96 min · ★ 5.3 · Horror, Thriller, Science Fiction

This deftly made French psychological thriller terrifies with its exploration of an experiment gone horribly wrong. Dr. Marc Lacroix, a psychiatrist specializing in brain functions, is obsessed with the link between mind and spirit. To find his link he studies the criminally insane. He builds a secret machine, known only to his mistress Marianne, in which he hopes to exchange minds between humans. He simultaneously wants to help the mentally ill recover, and he wants to experience their madness. He chooses the psychotic killer, Zyto, a man who stabbed at least three women, for his experiment. The initial experiment is successful and the two exchange minds. But trouble ensues when Zyto refuses to reverse the switch. There is little Marc can do when Zyto takes over Marc's life, and more ominously his wife and child whom are unknowingly in mortal danger. Marc, encased in Zyto's body, is returned to the asylum. Will Marc's wife recognize the danger? Will Zyto kill again?

Directed by François Dupeyron · Written by François Dupeyron

Your Rating

Cast

Gérard Depardieu Dr. Marc Lacroix
Nathalie Baye Marie Lacroix
Didier Bourdon Michel Zyto
Natalia Wörner Marianne
Julie Depardieu A nurse
Claude Berri Hugues
Erwan Baynaud Léonard Lacroix
Marc Andréoni Le gardien
Alain Azerot Un infirmier
Wilfred Benaïche Le patient
Christian Bujeau Martial
Patty Hannock Marie-Thérèse

Trailers & Videos

Make it a double feature

3h 11m together

The Machine

A Beating Heart

Both from François Dupeyron.

More from François DupeyronSee all →

Lamento

Lamento · 1988

Chronicles the hopeless reunion between a mother and daughter, as they try to rekindle their relationship after twelve years of being apart.

A Beating Heart

A Beating Heart · 1991

A Beating Heart

Mado is followed in the street by an unknown man. He offers her to go the hotel. She accepts, they sleep together and then split. Mado does not want to see him again, because she is married with Jean, and has a teenager son, Stephane. But Yves gave her his phone number. One day, Mado calls him.... An unusual love story.

The Dragoness

The Dragoness · 1983

When a lone jogger gets heavily hit on by a "hitchhiker" in a wheelchair...

The Officers' Ward

The Officers' Ward · 2001

The Officers' Ward

MovieDramaRomance

The first days of WWI. Adrien, a young and handsome lieutenant, is wounded by a piece of shrapnel. He will spend the entire wartime at the Val-de-Grâce Hospital, in Paris. Five long years, and his life will change forever...

Monsieur Ibrahim

Monsieur Ibrahim · 2003

Monsieur Ibrahim

Paris, 1960s. Momo, a resolute and independent Jewish teenager who lives with his father, a sullen and depressed man, in a working-class neighborhood, develops a close friendship with Monsieur Ibrahim, an elderly Muslim who owns a small grocery store.

One of a Kind

One of a Kind · 2013

When Frédi loses his mother, he realizes she has passed her healing gift on to him. Frédi rejects it totally, tangled up in his own unhappiness, until a fatal accident changes everything. He is forced to acknowledge that he had healing hands.

Le fils préféré

Le fils préféré · 1994

Le fils préféré

Jean-Paul Mantegna, the son of Italian immigrants now living in Nice, is a hunted man, riddled with debt and involved in borderline illegal companies. To extricate himself, he has to rely on Philippe and François, his two brothers, and on Raphaël, his father; a family torn by disputes and tragic events. However, by rebuilding family unity, Jean-Paul also discovers the secret of his own destiny...

Don't Make Trouble!

Don't Make Trouble! · 2001

Don't Make Trouble!

MovieAnimationComedy

Twelve short stories about racism in every day life.

C'est quoi la vie ?

C'est quoi la vie ? · 1999

C'est quoi la vie ?

In this drama, three generations of the same family work together on a farm in rural France. Elderly Noel takes pride in having worked this land nearly all his life. His son Marc now carries most of the responsibilities of the farm (as well as the debts), and he's starting to buckle under the strain. And Marc's son Nicolas hasn't decided what to do with his life; he has little interest in farming, but he isn't sure where his real talents lie. One day, after helping his cows give birth to new calves, Marc gets word that he must destroy all his cattle to prevent the spread of Mad Cow Disease. This proves the last straw for Marc, and he commits suicide. Noel doesn't handle his son's death well and ends up in a retirement home, while Marc's wife gets a job as a cashier and Nicolas looks for work (with little success) while searching for a beautiful and mysterious woman to whom he gave a ride.

Strange Place for an Encounter

Strange Place for an Encounter · 1988

Strange Place for an Encounter

France is a haughty, bourgeoise wife who is abandoned at the side of the road by her husband after a vicious quarrel. She meets Charles, a doctor. The meeting of the two strangers is the focus of the film, along with their encounters with characters at a truck stop.

Too Close to the Sun

Too Close to the Sun · 2015

Too Close to the Sun

A magistrate investigating a fraud case discovers the woman is the biological mother of her adopted child. Instead of recusing herself, the magistrate pursues the case further.

The Bridge

The Bridge · 1999

MovieRomanceDrama

Mina is a movie buff with a husband, Georges, who's out of work, and a 15-year-old son, Tommy. While Mina works part-time as a domestic for Claire Daboval, the family is terribly short on money, so when Georges is offered construction work on a massive bridge project, he immediately accepts, even though the job site is far away. One day, while taking in a matinee screening of West Side Story, Mina meets a man named Matthias, an engineer associated with the bridge project. It's love at first sight for the both of them, and while Mina has no desire to hurt Georges, who is a good and decent man, she has found another good and decent man whom she loves even more. Tommy, on the other hand, has to deal with this crisis in his parents' marriage while he's sorting out his own infatuation with Ms. Daboval's daughter, Lisbeth.

Little Secrets

Little Secrets · 2006

MovieDramaComedy

October 1962, the height of the Cuban missile crisis… Norbi, 12, lives in a small industrial town typical of southern Luxembourg. His father, very authoritarian, owns a bookstore-stationery that also serves as a store for religious items. That year, Norbi will be confronted with mysteries about sexuality, religion and war. Norbi will discover a new world, for him, it's time to show that he is no longer a child. Will Norbi obey?

Tresor

Nathalie and Jean-Pierre have been together for five years, to celebrate their anniversary, Jean-Pierre prepare a surprise present for his girlfriend: a cute four month english bullgod. Nathalie loves her present and calls the puppy "Tresor"; her relationship with the dog is close and strong since the begining but causes problems in the couple.

With a Little Help from Myself

With a Little Help from Myself · 2008

With a Little Help from Myself

Besieged matriarch Sonia tries to make certain her daughter's nuptials come off flawlessly even as events spiral out of control is in this dark comedy helmed by François Dupeyron. With Sonia's wayward eldest son under arrest on drug charges, she then discovers that her no-account hubby has gambled away the money set aside for the reception. Will Sonia and her family triumph or crumble in the face of adversity?

Love Reinvented

Love Reinvented · 1997

Love Reinvented

Different aspects of homosexual romance are explored in this compendium of ten short vignettes encompassing a broad look at AIDS and range for the tale of a lesbian teen trying to come out to her parents, to a gay man who shocks his lover by claiming to be pregnant, to another man's reminiscence of a brief affair with an HIV-positive man.

More Like This

Left Behind: World at War

Left Behind: World at War · 2005

Left Behind: World at War

MovieActionAdventure

A year and a half ago, the globe was hit with the biggest catastrophe it had ever seen. Without warning and without explanation, hundreds of millions simply vanished off the face of the Earth. The world was in chaos like never before. Yet somehow one man seemed to rise to the challenge. One man had the strength and conviction to unite a shattered world. One man gave the world hope. That man was Nicolae Carpathia, who now rules the entire world.

Stranger in Our House

Stranger in Our House · 1979

Stranger in Our House

MovieHorrorTV Movie

After a country family of five take in charming cousin Julie, whose parents recently died in a car crash, their teenage daughter Rachel grows to suspect that Julie has a sinister agenda.

Flag Day

Flag Day · 2021

MovieDramaThriller

A father lives a double life as a counterfeiter, bank robber and con man in order to provide for his daughter.

Howling: New Moon Rising

Howling: New Moon Rising · 1995

Howling: New Moon Rising

A number of vicious murders occur in a small California town after a motorcycle-riding stranger arrives. The gruesome slayings look disturbingly like the work of a werewolf. Meanwhile, in another nearby town, police are hot on the trail of a killer they believe is a werewolf.

Howling IV: The Original Nightmare

Howling IV: The Original Nightmare · 1988

Howling IV: The Original Nightmare

An author who was sent to the town Drakho, because of a nervous breakdown, gets wound up in a mystery revolving around demons and werewolves. She starts seeing ghosts and dismisses them as her own imagination, but when they turn out to be real she becomes suspicious of the odd town and of its past.

The Other Me

The Other Me · 2000

MovieTV MovieFamily

When Will Browning is threatened with military summer school if he doesn't get better grades, he decides to do a science project that will definitely get an A. So he buys some Ocean Pups, unhatched sea creatures that will look spectacular, but he hasn't bargained for the cloning agent that the unscrupulous manufacturers have put in the kit. Next thing he knows there's another him.

Centauro

Centauro · 2022

MovieActionCrime

Rafa's hooked on the pure, fiery feelings he gets from speed racing, but when his kid's mom gets mixed up with drug dealers, he burns rubber to save her.

Drácula

Drácula · 1931

A British estate agent travels to Transylvania to meet the mysterious Count Dracula, who is interested in leasing a London castle. After Dracula enslaves the agent and drives him to insanity, the pair return to London together, where Dracula, a secret bloodsucker, begins preying on socialites.

Blood from the Mummy's Tomb

Blood from the Mummy's Tomb · 1971

Blood from the Mummy's Tomb

Two Egyptologists, Professor Fuchs and Corbeck, are instrumental in unleashing unmitigated horror by bringing back to England the mummified body of Tara, the Egyptian Queen of Darkness. Fuchs’s daughter becomes involved in a series of macabre and terrifying incidents, powerless against the forces of darkness, directed by Corbeck, that are taking possession of her body and soul to fulfill the ancient prophesy that Queen Tara will be resurrected to continue her reign of unspeakable evil.

Sorcerer

Sorcerer · 1977

MovieThrillerAdventure

Four men from different parts of the globe, all hiding from their pasts in the same remote South American town, agree to risk their lives transporting several cases of dynamite (which is so old that it is dripping unstable nitroglycerin) across dangerous jungle terrain.

The Shrinking Man

The Shrinking Man · 2025

The Shrinking Man

MovieAdventureScience Fiction

Paul, is an ordinary man who divides his life between his shipbuilding company, his wife Elise and their daughter Mia. During a sea trip, Paul finds himself confronted with a strange, unexplained meteorological phenomenon. From then on, Paul shrinks inexorably, without science being able to explain why or be of any help to him. When, by accident, he finds himself a prisoner in his own cellar, and while he is only a few centimeters tall, he will have to fight to survive in this banal environment that has become perilous. During this experience, Paul will find himself confronted with himself, with his humanity, and will try to answer the great questions of existence.

Rate this film

Your ratings make Midnight smarter