Telling the story of a kind of Amélie Poulain with sewing superpowers, Sew Torn is a bit of a UFO in this panorama selection of contemporary cinema. Coming from German-speaking Switzerland, where this film was shot in a peaceful town lost in an idyllic valley. Director of photography Sebastian Klinger comes to talk to us about this shoot where the actress is killed at least three times on screen, and where the influence of the Coen brothers sometimes hovers over the crazy situations and somewhat strange characters. (FR)
Entirely filmed on the small island of Mandø, located on the southwest coast of Denmark, Basque filmmaker Juan Palacios’ documentary is both a tender portrait of its inhabitants and a testimony to life continuing against all odds in the face of rising sea levels and climate change. Shot in a 2.35:1 aspect ratio by the director himself, the film resolutely oscillates between a documentary approach in its content and a highly cinematic stylization in its form. We revisit with him this exploit, which took several years, spanning from the pandemic to the initial interactions with the locals, the filming, and the finalization of the film. This documentary is in competition for the Golden Frog award for Best Cinematography in Toruń.
A chronicle of the female condition during the 18th 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)
Agnieska Szeliga is a UK based camera operator and co-founder of "Women Behind The Camera" (WBTC). Her credits include B camera work on Michael Mann’s Ferrari, or "House of the Dragon" and "Gangs of London" series. She comes to talk to us about the Manaki Festival, her conception of the role of camera operator and of course about her 400 volunteer association who does a lot to promote diversity on the sets. (FR)
Selected in the Orizzonti section at the Venice Film Festival, the fifth film by director Carine Tardieu deals with the theme of family ties, over a two year period following a tragedy. From its first scenes, L’Attachement is characterized by a mother’s loss, yet the film manages to avoid the pathetic thanks to the luminous, innocent performance of the character of Elliot by 6-year-old César Botti. Elin Kirschfink AFC, SBC, was director of photography for this film produced by Fabrice Goldstein and Antoine Rein (KarKaré Productions). (FR)
With Planète B, filmmaker Aude Léa Rapin (Les héros ne meurent jamais, in 2018) offers us an ambitious tale of anticipation. Two dimensions - real and virtual - coexist in a paradoxical prison film where the inmates are placed in a very... summery atmosphere. Jeanne Lapoirie, AFC, and her gaffer Guillaume Ader were responsible for the cinematography of this plunge into a 15-year future where the government has devised new means of incarceration to counter a group of young activists bent on defending the planet. The director’s second film is presented out of competition as the opening film of Critics’ Week at the 81st Venice Film Festival. (FR)
At once the portrait of a woman, a tale and a political film, Mehdi M. Barsaoui’s Aïcha captures the mood of modern post Ben Ali Tunisia in the context of a multi-faceted thriller. While the journey of young Aya (Fatma Sfar) from her small town in southern Tunisia to the big city remains the main thread of the story, a host of secondary characters, both benevolent and malevolent, shape this coming-of-age tale in picaresque, social terms. Antoine Héberlé, AFC, returns to team up with the Tunisian director after his first film, Un fils, which won acclaim in 2019. Aïcha has been selected in the Orizzonti section at Venice. (FR)
After several documentaries on the Cambodian genocide, filmmaker Rithy Panh decided to venture into fiction, recreating the true story of journalists who got the only interview with the Khmer Rouge leader in 1978. This ambitious work combines scenes led by a prestigious cast, cutaway shots from archival footage, and long tracking shots of childlike models reminiscent of Michel Gondry’s style. The result is a strange film where naivety blends with historical reconstruction and characters sometimes happened to be on another planet. Aymerick Pilarski, AFC, lensed this show presented in the official Cannes Première selection. (FR)
Xavier Gens’ Sous la Seine has been available on Netflix since early June, and has since risen to become one of the most viewed programs on the platform. Meanwhile, the director, producers and the platform are being sued by another screenwriter who is claiming to have been the victim of plagiarism. This suspenseful film portrays the intrusion of a race of mutant sharks capable of adapting to fresh water and swimming up rivers, and has benefited from the fact that the Olympic Games are being held in Paris this year to generate buzz. Nicolas Massart, AFC, was in charge of the cinematography of this story, with many underwater scenes shot in the large European studio dedicated to this – Lites, in Brussels. (FR)
Presented during a special out-of-competition screening at the very beginning of the 77th Cannes Film Festival, director George Miller’s Furiosa adds a new dimension to the Mad Max saga he began 45 years ago. Focusing on the youthful character Furiosa (originally played on screen by Charlize Theron in Fury Road in 2015), this unprecedented change of lead character for the franchise allows the Australian director to feminise his narrative. And most of all to offer a duo of actors from the new generation (Anya Taylor Joy and Chris Hemsworth) an opportunity to portray a true Shakespearean revenge tragedy amidst apocalyptic chase scenes. Simon Duggan, ACS, ASC, also new to the franchise talks to us about this 109-day shoot (for A team), conducted during the Covid period in the heart of the Australian desert. (FR)
Selected for Berlinale 2024, Claire Burger’s Langue étrangère (Foreign Language) crosses paths between France and Germany through a first adolescent love story. Julien Poupard, AFC, reunites with the director (with whom he has already shot several films) to bring this story of sensual, amorous and political awakening to life between Leipzig and Strasbourg. The film is in official competition for the 74th Golden Bear. (FR)
The 2024 winner of the Pierre Angénieux Special Encouragement Award is of Estonian origin. She has been based in the USA for 12 years, spending time in China first, just after finishing high school. This was her first experience living abroad, where she studied, learned a bit of the language and shot her first documentary films. Kadri Koop is a curious young woman, with varied experiences around the world, now working between Europe and Hollywood, where she resides and tends to a beautiful vegetable garden under the Californian sun. She’s here at Cannes to talk to us about images, faces and zoom lenses! (FR)
“You’re not taking the road tonight?”, and now that Jérémie’s stay in his childhood village, where he’s come to attend the funeral of his former boss, lasts longer than expected. As he wanders the autumn forest in search of porcini mushrooms and pays incongruous visits to his childhood friends, he weaves a web of desires and frustrations whose threads seem to escape him. For their third film together, after L’Inconnu du lac and Rester vertical, Alain Guiraudie and Claire Mathon plunge us back into a film noir whose exploration is infinite, and whose astonished faces will mark us for a long time to come.
In this second part of the long dialogue between Yves Cape, AFC, and Caroline Champetier, AFC, about Michel Franco’s Sundown, we discuss color grading, skins, neutrality, prison, the accuracy of sets, light direction... all the questions that are not just a matter of technical or aesthetic choices.
Carried by a dazzling cast, with young Mikey Madison in the lead role as a stripper, Sean Baker’s Anora is a captivating film. Its writing is both simple and precise, steering the plot in one direction only to better surprise the audience and ultimately deliver a powerful final scene that is likely to go down in festival history. Shot like great American cinematographers of the 70s used to do (Kodak film, 4-perf Scope, zoom lenses, and negative flashing during shooting), this cinematic tour de force is truly one of the major events of the 77th edition of the Festival. Drew Daniels, who shot the film, explains that nothing replaces the thrill one can experience on such a film as a director of photography, making creative decisions live on set rather than relying solely on modern digital camera & post-production tools. (FR)
Niki, a biopic about Niki de Saint Phalle, presented in the Un Certain Regard selection, is the directorial debut of actress Céline Sallette. In this interview, the film’s cinematographer, Victor Seguin, AFC, answers questions from his colleague Jean-François Hensgens, AFC, SBC.
An adaptation of Vanessa Schneider’s story Tu t’appelais Maria Schneider, Jessica Palud’s second feature film, Maria depicts the destructive beginnings of actress Maria Schneider’s career. Through the reconstruction of a scene which caused a scandal in Bernardo Bertollucci’s 1972 film Last Tango in Paris, the director condemns domination and the abuse of power in the film industry, a subject that has become highly relevant and necessary. The cinematography, by Sébastien Buchmann, AFC, is a subtle reminder of the seventies, and revisits the film sets of that era. He reflects on this particularly captivating experience as a cinematographer. Maria is presented in the Official Selection, Cannes Première, at the Cannes 2024 Festival. (BB)
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 77th 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, 13th 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).
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