FOZ presents WORLD SALES: CELLULOID DREAMS IN PARIS 2, RUE TURGOT - 75009 PARIS T: +33 1 4970 0370 F: + 33 1 4970 0371 [email protected] www.celluloid-dreams.com IN CANNES 2 LA CROISETTE - 3RD FLOOR - 06400 CANNES T: +33 4 9298 9650 F: +33 4 9298 9648 LOUIS GARREL VAHINA GIOCANTE MATHIEU AMALRIC INTERNATIONAL PRESS: CELLULOID DREAMS 2 LA CROISETTE - 4TH FLOOR - 06400 CANNES A CURTAIN RAISER T: +33 4 9298 9155 F: +33 4 9298 9648 A FILM BY FRANÇOIS OZON MAGALI MONTET E: [email protected] M: +33 6 7163 3616 GORDON SPRAGG E: [email protected] M: +33 6 7525 9791 From “Un incompris” by Henry de Montherlant MONTHERLANT ABOUT HIS PLAY “UN INCOMPRIS” “Madame Mary Morgan, manager of the Saint-Georges Theatre, which was going to put on “Fils de Personne” for the first time, asked me to write a curtain raiser, without which the evening would be a bit short. I consequently wrote “Un Incompris”, which went on before “Fils de Personne” at the dress rehearsal. But the next day, a decree was issued ordering theatres to close at ten in the evening (it was during German occupation), and “Un Incompris”, put on in the provinces and abroad, was never staged in Paris. I was interested in making “Un Incompris” a sort of counterpart to “Fils de Personne”, a counterpart drawing on caricature. Bruno separates from Rosette, while still loving her the way Georges separates from Gillou, while still loving him; and both of them do it in the name of principle. Bruno could be Georges at the age of twenty. But the father and son’s tragedy is treated in a serious vein. I left a touch of comedy in the lovers’ tragedy, which exists in every situation in life. Bruno is both heroic and ridiculous. His final “We’ll see!” indicates his touching uncertainty about his future conduct.” SYNOPSIS Bruno and his friend Pierre are in Paris in Bruno’s bachelor flat awaiting the arrival of Rosette, who’s late again. But this time, Bruno’s mind is made up; if Rosette is more than 45 minutes late, the relationship is over. Did you immediately think of adapting it for the cinema? Yes, in the same way I did when I discovered the Fassbinder play “Water INTERVIEW WITH drops on burning rocks”. I thought it could be made into a film. FRANÇOIS OZON And when one of my projects was delayed by production problems, I thought about this piece. I contacted Montherlant’s heirs to ask them if the rights to the play were available and they said yes. They were a bit surprised that I was interested in this unknown work. How did A CURTAIN RAISER come into being? A few years ago I was wandering round a bookshop and I came across Why make a short film today? a play by Montherlant with a title that immediately appealed to me: I was really in the mood for shooting something. And waiting for a “Fils de Personne”, (No one’s Son). I was intrigued and I bought it. But film to be set up when you’re not sure it’s really going to happen is when I started to read the play I was disappointed and almost fell asleep. always really disquieting. I needed to get out and work with actors and However, at the end of the collection there was another, shorter play regain a bit of the lightness I seemed to have lost. And it was a real around twenty pages long entitled “Un Incompris” (A Misunderstood pleasure to work for a week with a new crew that I’d never met before. Man). I fell in love with the story immediately and particularly with I’d forgotten just how many radical economic and aesthetic choices Pierre’s final monologue. The play seemed simultaneously funny, modern you have to make when you’re making a short film. Knowing that we and moving, whilst being written in a classical and poetic style, which only had five days to shoot in and a very limited amount of film stock elevated it from what might have been an otherwise mundane tale. brought back some happy memories. Why did you change the title? Because “Un Incompris” is already the title of a very beautiful film by Comencini and because there’s a continual reference throughout Montherlant’s text to performance, theatricality, genres (farce or drama), audience reactions and the critics. I actually learned what un lever de rideau - a curtain raiser - was through reading this play. It’s a little one-act play, often a comedy, written to be performed as a prologue to a play of more classical length and form. I liked the idea of a minor, light text and short films are the same thing as curtain raisers when they come before a feature in the cinema. Choosing this title was also a way for me to pay homage to short films, which I’ve done a lot of. Weren’t you worried by the theatricality and the length of the speeches? I’ve always been interested in the idea of theatricality in the cinema and I’ve always thought that the effects of alienation weren’t an obstacle to identification. Of course, it demands definite choices, a special way of directing the actors and above all a lot of work to get over the difficulty of the language and make sure it’s understood. But that’s what excites be caught up in the story immediately. It was without doubt the me about adapting a play, this confrontation with a language that isn’t quickest bit of casting I’ve ever done. It was so obvious. Mathieu my own and that I try to appropriate through the bodies and voices. Amalric and Louis Garrel, in the male roles, both seemed to speak When I first got people around me to read the play they were sceptical. in ways that corresponded with the differences between the two They liked the story of the young man with his principles, but they characters. Mathieu enunciates very clearly, unlike Louis, who talks thought it was too theoretical and wordy. They said, “Are you sure it very quickly and often eats his words. I thought the two different will make a good film? It’s not very visual”. It seemed to me that, if we styles of delivery might be interesting when opposed to one another. had very good actors, we’d be able to bring the piece to life and touch As for Vahina, that’s an old story; I asked her to play a part in 8 people. The subject concerns everyone, anyone who, having been in WOMEN, but two weeks before we started shooting she confessed a relationship with someone, has found themselves confronted with that she was pregnant, and as a result she wasn’t able to do the film. dilemmas and compromises faced with the person they love. She was very upset about it at the time, and so was I. I promised her that one day we’d work together. How did you choose the actors? I needed experienced actors who could not only make the text The actors look very elegant in their costumes, which have a timeless air. understood but get beyond it, so that we weren’t constrained by it. For me, the film is about ideals, youth, purity and innocence and it The actors had to be able to speak the dialogue fluently, and at the immediately made me think of New Wave films. Rohmer of course, same time exist physically. I needed them to bring the text to life but, above all, the romantic films made by Godard in the 1960’s. on screen in a strong and sensual way so that the audience would I wanted a white apartment like the one in A WOMAN IS A WOMAN with a few bright colours that stood out like the green dress and the red blanket. The stylisation of the costumes, the set and the colours gives the film a timeless aspect. You don’t really know when it’s set. It’s like a world within itself inhabited by people from good families. We had a joke with the actors saying that Louis was our Jean-Pierre Léaud, Mathieu our Jean-Claude Brialy and Vahina our Anna Karina. Did you change the original script? Yes, I cut and simplified some of the dialogue. More than anything else, in the play Bruno and Rosette don’t make love, they just kiss, and it’s from that moment that Bruno really decides to finish with her. It seemed to me that if they made love it added more force and modernity to the scene. On the one hand, there’s something cruel about it because Bruno knows he’s making love for the last time with her while she doesn’t, or doesn’t want to know. So it might be said he’s taking advantage of her. We might also wonder if this young girl wasn’t filming in Scope, a format I’d used before in TIME TO LEAVE and a virgin and that maybe this was her first time. On the other hand, it which, paradoxically, works very well with intimate scenes, verbal added another layer of ambiguity to the text and, above all, something sparring matches and characters’ internal conflicts. more dramatic. Montherlant saw “Un incompris” as a comedy and Bruno’s character was a bit ridiculous.