After the retrospective of Olivier Assayas, a well-known film director, script writer, and film critic, a many-time participant of the Cannes Festival, came to an end recently, on January 29 the annual festival of the most sensational French premieres of the year, the 10th Evenings of French Cinema, organized by the Arthouse Traffic Company, was launched at the movie theater “Kyiv.” The program included films that have won awards of international festivals and new actor’s works by Catherine Deneuve, Juliette Binoche, and Mathieu Amalric.
The festival will also show the new picture by Olivier Assayas, presented in the main competition of the Cannes Film Festival, the drama Clouds of Sils Maria, dedicated to the work of actor. European celebrity Juliette Binoche plays the role of Maria Enders, an actress who is already getting old and who returns to the play that made her famous. Quite unexpectedly, the secondary roles are performed by Hollywood stars: Kristen Stewart (The Twilight Saga, On the Road) and Chloe Grace Moretz (The Amityville Horror, Let Me In, Hugo, and The Equalizer). The language of the film is English, and it removes the borders between scenic transformation and a different life led by actors away from the spotlights. Maria-Binoche is learning the role with a younger performer, Valentine (played by Kristen Stewart): the paradox of the situation is in the fact that Valentine must play the role of the very cruel heroine who made Maria famous before, and Maria, in her turn, has to play the role of an older woman, a victim. The scenes with the two actresses who are trying to get on in solitude in the Swiss Alps at times resemble Ingmar Bergman’s masterpiece Persona (one of the heroines is a famous actress as well, and the plot is based on the opposition of strong female characters), but on the whole the story is about the specifics of scenic calling, which too much depends on time and judgment of the audience.
In Kyiv and Odesa the films will be shown in original language with Ukrainian subtitles.
The film director gave a press conference after the premiere of Clouds of Sils Maria.
Can we say that Clouds of Sils Maria is a parallel film to Bergman’s Persona?
“I won’t mind if you say so. But I didn’t build on his films. In this picture I wanted to focus attention on the work of an actress, first and foremost Binoche. On the way she creates her image. While I was writing the script, I of course understood that in some way I am referring to Bergman’s Persona, that I am on his territory, but still I was careful enough and didn’t watch this film again. Of course, I won’t resist the comparison. I am simply not a fan of his creative work: I knew him personally and I have published a book of the numerous interviews I have recorded with him. So, this is meaningful for Clouds of Sils Maria as well.”
Don’t you think that the plot is too simple for Binoche to reveal her talent?
“Binoche has a great career of an actress. She has had many more complicated images, but I wanted to create a role where she would be herself and showed the everyday life of an actress. This is not a complicated psychological task, yet it allows Juliette to show herself from a somewhat different angle.”
Won’t this double transformation confound the audience?
“Judging by the success of the picture, the audience has perceived it well. I am sure there is a moment of a game which sometimes makes you smile, because some hidden things are revealed. But I think Clouds of Sils Maria tells about the flow of time where any person, this time an actress, accepts her universal image, reconciles with it, and moves along the flow of time.”
As for you, do you feel that you belong to our time?
“We don’t choose a time to live in. I am simply trying to take the best from the conditions we have been given, in spite of the fact that there are many bad things.”
Is the plot based on real events?
“I have never taken plots from everyday press or any other scenes of actual life. I have always taken interest in historical reference. For example, my film about the famous terrorist Carlos is based on concrete archives, 20 years later after the depicted events. Or Sentimental Destinies, a novel that depicts the process of moving to industry in the world. I believe time is needed to show any actual event. A director’s work needs facts to be put in order, then scrupulously examined, not to show them hastily.”
One of the characters of Clouds of Sils Maria, a young director, is going to Ukraine to make a film. Why?
“When I was writing the script, it seemed to me absolutely real that a young American director is going to shoot cinema to Ukraine. Hopefully, it will be like that.”
You’ve mentioned terrorism. This is a problem in France, I mean the attack on the editorial office of the satirical magazine Charlie, and in Ukraine because of the Donbas crisis. While shooting Carlos, did you make a conclusion where terrorism comes from?
“There are two answers. The first one is practically impossible, because it is in the metaphysical, philosophical ground: where all misfortunes and human evil come from. This is hard to answer. Probably, everyone looks for the answer himself. But there is another aspect. Terrorism has existed in all times, but we pretend to be discovering it anew. Any terrorist act is a well-planned action, which cannot be isolated from the society; this is above all the weapons of war, either political or real war. A terrorist act appears following the instructions of certain people who immediately find people ready to accomplish it. This is no secret.”
