Basile Giroux

"A cleansing fire always burns little Mandus, but it purifies and it makes anew."

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Basile
Biographical information
Full name	Monsieur Basile Giroux
Also known as	“Mon chéri” (by Justine Florbelle)
Born	c. 1818-1828
Age	30-40
Active	c. 1858
Physical description
Species	Human Suitor
Nationality	French
Gender	Male
Eye colour	None (abacinated)
Hair colour	None (bald)
Career and family information
Occupation	Carpenter (possible)
Spouse(s) or partner(s)	Justine Florbelle (lover, captor)
Non-familial relationships	Aloïs Racine (romantic rival) Malo de Vigny (romantic rival)
Behind the scenes
Voice actor (English)	Jon St. John
Appearances
Justine	Full (antagonistic) Audio (phonographs, etc.) Mentioned

“

I'll kill you, you whore!

”

Basile, threatening his torturer.

Monsieur Basile Giroux (French: /ba.zil ʒiʁu/) was an able-bodied, ill-tempered woodworker turned insane and violent by the relentless psychological and physical torture of the noblewoman he sought romantically, who served as both captive and guard in the Cabinet of Perturbation. Basile is one of the monstrous Suitors from Amnesia: Justine, and as such, he is one of the game's three major antagonists.

He is voiced by Jon St. John.

History

Early life

Little is known about Basile Giroux’s life before the events of Amnesia: Justine. That being said, Basile was born somewhere in France in the early 19th Century. In his adulthood, he is heavily implied to have become a carpenter, which suggests that he was born into a family that specialized in that trade.

Sometime before 1858, Basile became romantically involved with the enigmatic yet unsavory noblewoman, Mademoiselle Justine Florbelle. It is unknown how exactly the working class Basile met Justine, although it is possible she hired him for some sort of woodworking project and later decided to toy with his attraction to her.

Three Suitors

Apart from Basile, Justine’s affections were courted by two other men: the young nobleman Aloïs Racine and the up and coming violinist virtuoso Malo de Vigny. Justine pit all three men against each other for her own amusement, but it is implied that a special hatred developed between Basile and Aloïs, as the latter wished to kill the former.

After Malo gave a drunken disaster of a performance at a Parisian conservatory, Justine bid both Basile and Aloïs to carry him off the stage.

Abacination

Sometime after the conservatory event, Justine convinced Aloïs to drug Basile’s absinthe with bromide, which gave her the opportunity to capture and transport him down to the Cabinet of Perturbation.

Sometime after, Basile regained consciousness and found himself restrained in one of Justine’s contraptions, she immediately told him to speak into the phonograph so that she might record the conversation. After discovering this, he told Justine that he was tired of her games, but she forced him to say her favored compliment, that her "beauty is blinding." At that moment, Justine blinded Basile, presumably with a hot iron. As Basile screamed, Justine laughed and taunted him. He then threatened to kill her for blinding him.

Information

Basile is a more threatening enemy than Aloïs and has very aggressive voice lines, threatening to murder Justine for her crimes.

Encounters

He appears in the basement area after leaving the library section, whispering threats and curses as he hunts for the player. When he appears, all the lights in the basement will be mysteriously blown out, and the door will slam shut, locking the player in.

Behavior

Once spawned, Basile does not de-spawn and will continue to patrol the area looking for the player. It is necessary to sneak past him in order to continue. However, this isn't too difficult as long as the player does so without making too much noise since Basile is blind.

Once the the player enters the exit corridor, Basile realizes what is happening and will attempt to catch them.

Strategy

As soon as Basile Giroux appears the player can hide in a closest spot to the corridor from which Basile walks out from and start throwing rocks in the center of the basement. Once Basile wanders off to investigate the source of the sound player can either sneak away to the exit or make a run for it. A much riskier fit includes the player running right through the basement and dashing past Basile. Basile will attempt to bash Justine but will miss and it will take some time for him wind up and charge after her.

Description

Physical appearance

Basile appears in-game exactly the same as the other two Suitors, as a malnourished, nearly-skeletal, shaven, nude man hobbling around the dungeons of the Florbelle Estate. His skin is pale and numerous lacerations can be seen on his body. His hands and legs are wrapped in chains and there is a metal wheel around his neck to keep him from resting. Basile's exact age is unknown, and is further concealed by his disfigurement, but is general demeanor and the cadence of his voice suggests he is between 30 and 40 years old.

Personality

Basile Giroux is implied to have been a temperamental man even before Justine toyed with and tortured him, and was possibly even abusive to her. He is further implied to have held a mutual hatred with Aloïs Racine. His anger towards Justine originates from an event where Justine drugged him, tied him up and blinded him after forcing him to read the line she prepared for him. Basile appears to have retained the most sanity of the three Suitors and wants to exact retribution upon the woman who ruined him.

Occupation

It is possible that Basile was a carpenter, as entering the empty prison cell between the other two cells (where Aloïs and Malo were being held) causes flashback sounds of sawing wood and hammering. Other elements in the game that hint to Basile's former career are that Aloïs' note stated Basile was strong, and if the player enters any other cell, it won't produce flashback sounds that require physical work (apart from the racquet sounds in Aloïs' cell and violin sounds in Malo's). Several bricks in Basile's cell were removed, but not without it causing injury, as there is blood around the brick slots and on the bricks themselves.

Quotes

Main article: Basile Giroux/Dialogue

• "I'll rip your head off!"
• "You thought you'd get away, didn't you!?"

Trivia

• Strictly, the real circumstances of Basile's blinding are unknown.
  • The timing of Basile's blinding cannot be said with certainty. While, during the phonograph recording, he does scream in what could be pain, it could just as easily be a scream of shock at the realization he'd been blinded beforehand. Basile is said to be "strong" by Aloïs, and Justine mockingly taunts him by claiming her physical weakness. While it is by no means impossible for Justine to blind him in the moment by a weapon, chemical, or machine, in his drug-addled state, the dialogue between the two suggests equally plausibly that Basile was blinded prior to waking up and merely had this fact revealed to him during the recording.
  • Additionally, since the wax cylinder is an audio recording, with neither Justine nor Basile making explicit reference to the method of blinding, and since there is no tell-tale noise (such as a piercing sound for a spike or blade entering his eyes, or a sizzle for a burning-hot poker or brand), exactly how Justine blinded Basile is impossible to say. He may have been poisoned, or had his eyes plucked out, or had them chemically burned, or possibly pierced, sliced, or branded. No other known notes or recordings touch on the event, so the precise method is a mystery.
• Basile's given name is pronounced "BAH-zeel" in French, equivalent to the English name "Basil" and the Russian name "Vasily," and is ultimately derived from Ancient Greek Basíleios, meaning "king" or "kingly."
  • As Basile's name is spoken by Justine Florbelle in a wax cylinder recording for the phonograph, it is one of the few names given a pronunciation in-game, along with Justine's own name.
• Basile's surname is pronounced, very roughly, "JEE-roo" in French, with a softer "j" sound and a gutteral "r." It is a surname shared by a famous hockey player from Quebec, Claude Giroux, and an influential pedagogical scholar and cultural critic, Henry Armand Giroux. It is associated with the historic region in southern France known as Languedoc, where a related Romance language, Occitan, was and is spoken.

Gallery