AFC’s Conversations

Eric Gautier, AFC, answers a question regarding the potential paradox of filming a movie about a hypothetical apparition by the Virgin Mary with a smile and a recollection about the beginning of his adventure with Xavier Giannoli: “It’s a bit of a challenge to film the mystery of faith. The love of God is like any sort of love: there is no tangible proof, just the gift of oneself. Sincerity (and lies, like in other of Giannoli’s films) is at the heart of the story. The loneliness of the two characters, Jacques (Vincent Landon) and Anna (Galatea Bellugi) is the spark that sets the story in motion.”

Filmed in two weeks "like doing a movie among friends", the film Climax is faithful to the themes and style of Gaspar Noé (sex, drugs and a descent into hell). Mixing improvisation and extremely precise staging (like the choreography that opens the film), Benoît Debie, SBC, explains how he approached this shoot full of energy and things a little crazy ... (FR)

Director of photography Agnès Godard, AFC, has collaborated with Claire Denis for almost thirty years, since her first feature, Chocolat, in competition at Cannes in 1988. Director and cinematographer met on a Wim Wenders shoot, where Denis was the assistant director, and Godard the assistant to legendary cinematographer Henri Alekan.
Claire Denis believes “the image speaks to us, first and foremost”. In Let the Sunshine In, which opens the Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes, Agnès Godard accomplishes that aim, with a pearly, radiant image rendering Juliette Binoche (even more) beautiful. (BB)

A chronicle of the female condition during the 18^th century, The Devil’s Bath, directed by the duo of filmmakers Severin Fiala and Veronika Franz, portrays the life of Agnes, a young peasant who discovers married life with her new husband. Filmed with great historical accuracy, this meticulous recreation of rural German customs during the Enlightenment is as chilling as it is haunting.
Austrian cinematographer Martin Gschlacht, AAC, brought this dark and cruel story to life. Based on a book and the analysis of trial records from 1701, the film is masterfully acted by the young Austrian singer Anja Plaschg ("Soap & Skin"). In this interview, we discuss this piercing production, filmed on location in the Austrian and German forests during the depths of winter. (FR)

At the last Cannes Film Festival we started a series of interviews with directors of photography who were not members of the AFC.

I had the pleasure of meeting Lubomir Bakchev at the special screening, organized jointly with the CST, of A Secret by Claude Miller, photographed by Gérard de Battista.

I knew that the release of The Secret of the Grain (La Graine et le mulet) by Abdellatif Kechiche was imminent and I asked Lubomir to see a preview. I then suggested to Lubomir that we extend our conversation with the present interview.

If I had one wish to make for the AFC, it is that interviews, like the one of Gérard de Battista by Wilfrid Sempé, become a means of strengthening relationships and kinship between members, and of reinforcing that most important subject for the future of our association: the image of a film.

Enjoy the interview. Eric Guichard

Successfully combining family drama, a narcotics thriller, and a musical ending with a Georges Brassens song is not an easy task. This is the extraordinary challenge that Jacques Audiard set himself with Emilia Perez, the strangest and most original film of the 77^th Cannes selection. And since its 12-minute standing ovation at the Grand Théâtre Lumière, one of the most serious contenders for the Palme d’Or. Paul Guilhaume, AFC, who also worked on Audiard’s previous film, Paris, 13^th District, shares the behind-the-scenes details of this unique project, which required nearly three years of preparation. He discussed, among other things, the reproduction of Mexico in a Paris studio and how rhythm influenced his visual approach to the film (FR).

Jacques Audiard is what one might call a habitué of the Cannes Film Festival. Besides his Golden Palm Award for Dheepan, in 2015, he has presented most of his films at Cannes. This year, he is offering audiences a study based around the love relationships of four young people of different backgrounds, but who all live in the same neighborhood in Paris. A new choral film photographed in black-and-white by Paul Guilhaume, AFC. (FR)

Cinematographer Paul Guilhaume, AFC, worked with Léa Mysius on Ava (Critics’ Week 2017, Best Cinematography award in Stokholm, 2017) and Marie Monge on Joueurs (Directors’ Fortnight 2018). He has regularly shot for documentarist Sébastien Lifshitz (Les Vies de Thérèse, Directors’ Fortnight 2016) and also Adolescentes and Sasha (to be released). He worked with Aude Léa Rapin on Heros Don’t Die, a film which mixes the genres of fiction and documentary, and which was selected in the 58^th Critics’ Week. (BB)