“He fascinates because he feels things that we don’t allow ourselves.”

He is a bad romance actor and screenwriter, a chameleon who has rewritten his life at the expense of others, living in up to four simultaneous relationships with women in different countries. To French Marianne, he was Alexandre, a Brazilian thoracic surgeon. Polish Kasia from Warsaw knew him as Ricardo, an engineer working in Paris. In the eyes of adolescent psychologist Nicole, he was the romantic Daniel, an Argentinian, army doctor. Carolina, who met him in a cafe in Paris, thought he was Brazilian and a Peugeot engineer, the son of a lawyer who grew up in the silk business. For Bruna, a Brazilian hairstylist and makeup artist, he was a caring doctor and lover who did not make the latter’s trans identity an issue. All of them have had more or less long and attractive relationships with this temptress, at the same time, without knowing it. Everyone was subjected to this The man with 1000 faces which portrays Sonja Kronlund the man with 1000 faces a documentary film adapted from his investigative book of the same name (Ed. Grassett, January 2024).

This tale of romantic deception, due in theaters on April 17, was discovered by a documentarian by accident in 2017. Marianna, one of the man’s victims, is a friend of a friend. The mother of a child born from an artificial union with a cheater tells about her love tragedy to a journalist who reports on her dedication in France Culture’s “Les pieds sur terre”. Deeply wounded Marian is the one who took out the crook. When she could no longer contact him five months into her pregnancy, he tried to call her family; the numbers he gave were wrong. He smells a trick and is able to connect to his digital accounts; he used the computer often. He then discovers a constellation of profiles and relationships for his “lover”. Little by little, other women learn the truth through her. “After the radio broadcast, this absurd story remained in my mind,” explains the director. I wasn’t aware at the time, but no doubt it was because it echoed mine. I have often been attracted to manipulators and liars. When I was young I myself lived with an Englishman who identified himself as an American, and who, although he said he was working, spent his days in the library.’

The subject of his film, Ricardo, as he calls him, talks about everything: family, work, loyalty, beliefs, social status, friendships… He is talkative, cultured, intelligent. Her imaginary personas are each more captivating than the last, her adaptability and unerring memory unfathomable. He circulates the objects among each person, but discreetly enough that it goes unnoticed. He also asks the women in his life for money, but not enough to raise any real suspicions. “This man is all the more formidable because he goes unnoticed, because he has the face and life of Mr. Aimeman. We detect deception only by the impression it leaves. A kind of strange sensation of fascination and anxiety,” says Patrick Charrier, a doctor of psychology and criminology. Shapeshifter victims are not alike. they are all looking for love, but they don’t have the same expectations and needs. Endowed with great situational and emotional intelligence, he adapts to each of them. “There are no victim profiles,” says the director. I wanted to emphasize this point to absolve women of guilt, to tell them that “it can happen to anyone.” They really have nothing to blame. They weren’t gullible, but being in love usually makes you turn your head and let your guard down. With his emotional intelligence, he played a lot.

Motor perversity?

But why did he one day decide to become this fabulous? Is it the adrenaline? The pleasure of romantic conquest. The consequences of mental illness. “We can think of dissociative identity disorders, which are often associated with early trauma that splits the self into different parts. Traumatized children must create a new identity to protect the victimized identity in order to survive.” The hypothesis seems probable. The investigation reveals Ricardo’s painful past. beaten by an alcoholic father, raised in poverty 70 km from Sao Paola, he invented a twin as a child. But where the game mostly stops in adulthood, he extends it. At the age of 20, he posed as a police officer who infiltrated a gang. “It fills the identity gap. To be all of these is to prove to yourself that you are somebody,” adds Patrick Charrier, who is also the director of Forhuman, a consulting firm specializing in human behavior and collective dynamics at work. The latter, however, puts forward another theory about the chameleon. “In true dissociative disorder, the individuals are not aware of each other. It is not so here. he knows what he’s doing and finds pleasure where mere mortals would feel guilty. He involves others in his lies, even to the point of having children. He is more than a pathological liar. This is more perversion.’ In the course of his misdeeds, Ricardo fathered four or five children he did not care for, and cheated at least twenty victims into long-term relationships, including: Kronlund, who says he was as horrified as he was intrigued by the charlatan. “He fascinates because he crosses the lines of morality and experiences things we don’t allow ourselves to do: polygamy, dishonest lies, fantasized identities,” analyzes Patrick Charrier. But it’s also destabilizing because, faced with it, there are women who, anchored in reality and morality, suffer.

“Symbolic Retribution”

Some wanted to remain anonymous on the screen. their story is embodied by actresses. On the other hand, he is shown in his true face without a filter. “We have assumed the legal risks. I can’t ask women who took years to convince me to testify openly and then cover up the culprit. We cannot protect this man and expose his victims to shame and humiliation.” In 2021, after finding him in Poland with the help of a detective, the director traps the forger. he poses as a journalist doing a story about well-integrated immigrants. In front of the camera, he repeats his charming act, giving the interlocutor exactly what he expects. He is Ricardo, a 41-year-old Brazilian, well-rounded, living in Poland for 6 years, working in cyber security, married, father of two daughters aged 6 and 8. “At first I thought I’d tell him the truth about my intentions, but I quickly realized he’d deny his past and create a new script like always. He lies the way he breathes, like a drug addict.”

In his new life, Ricardo goes crazy for running. or Feigning the need to illustrate her subject, Sonja Kronlund makes her run again and again in front of her lens. “I manage Ricardo and I think about these women. I’m neither a judge nor a psychologist, that’s all I have to offer them, but we’ll use it. Come on, run, Coco,” she jokes in her voiceover in the feature film. The run lasts, he sweats, always with a smile. The audience cheers. “It’s the sprinkler. This sarcasm is like me, it’s my way of protecting myself. This is also a small symbolic recompense to the women who suffered,” explains the director, who with this documentary primarily intends to give a voice, a body and a voice to the victims. “The writing and filming coincided with the #Metoo movement and without me realizing it, The man with 1000 faces has become a personal way of coping with it. The reinforcement slowly increased. As the project progressed, I felt I was in the right place.”

The man with 1000 faces By Sonia Kronlund. In cinemas from April 17.