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Two Pictures a Day in Siberia : sixth week
From 1 to 7 march 2015
This is the continuation of the daily photo journal that Gilles Porte, AFC, has been keeping while shooting Safy Nebbou’s film The Consolations of the Forest in Siberia. Gilles has been asking other members of the team to give him one of the two photos sent to us every day, and writes the legends himself. Take a look at these images from their sixth week on location.
Siberian mildness
“Dear Leslie. It is likely that on Cyril’s return, you don’t find the skin of your man as soft as planned … Since our hands are turning into leather, little by little, do not hesitate to consider a list of small works to do in your beautiful house (walls to be brought down, floors to be built, etc.) that Cyril will enjoy doing while being at it… Kisses to the girls who are certainly going to find their father changed a little. Gilles” (Gilles Porte, Sunday 1 March)
Horizontality
Day off. Some play table tennis, some are still asleep, some are going for a walk, and many are getting a massage. Frédéric Sauvagnac freezes once again the lake Baïkal under the ice. In a few weeks, it will be too late… (Photo Frédéric Sauvagnac, production manager, Sunday 1 March)
Shaman spirit, are you there ?
If “The number of shooting days will remain unchanged” (sic), what I promised to my daughter is totally questioned : going back by Paris, I would have found her… She would have accompanied me during the 2d part of the shooting in Siberia during the school holidays and we would have make it both to Mongolia, in search of children met six years ago behind a window.Watch the trailer of the movie Dessine-toi (Draw yourself). As it is still “possible” (sic) that this scenario takes place as initially planned, I send an SOS with my socks if ever a shaman spirit came to pass by. (Gilles Porte, Monday 2 March)
My label sulks
We were waiting for dusk to fall a bit more as to shoot the cabin in the best light. Safy takes advantage of this period of time as to ask Raphaël Personnaz to play the trumpet on the lake Baïkal. There’s fire in the sky and it’s reflecting in a gigantic mirror. Stangely, Syrine’s drawing turns its back to what I’m shooting… (Photo by Thomas Colban, 2d assistant director, Monday 2 March)
Is the speed of sound higher than which of the light ?
When the sound and the light conjugate together… Here, Laurent Cercleux, sound engineer. (Gilles Porte, Tuesday 3 March)
Aerolotka
In The Consolations of the Forest in Siberia, Teddy gets lost in a snowstorm. As to recreate the wind, we’re working with a small hovercraft led by our drivers. From left to right, Samia, direction UAZ driver, Timothy, 2d AC, Benjamin, key grip, who cobbled together an ice skate dolly, Sergueï, camera UAZ driver, and Marie-Sophie, 1st AC. (Photo by Cyril Girard, gaffer, Tuesday 3 March)
Loss of horizontality
While we are in a region that benefits from the same period of sunshine as California, Frédéric Sauvagnac, production manager, works under a small Ikea lamp with a cardboard diary and a production schedule. He imagines all the possible scenarios he will have to make up according to the dates of the collapse of the lake… He has to juggle between the desire of many to go back to Paris, the impossibility to miss this moment for the dramatic art, dates of visa of a French team that cannot exceed three months, and the substantial savings for the production on round trips for about twenty French people… As if by chance, the frame over his desk, in which is a panoramic photo of the Lake Baikal, lost of its horizontality. (Gilles Porte, Wednesday 4 March)
Hours of Equivalence
Benjamin, key grip, is sat on a weight while Franck, boom operator, and I, are waiting. Maybe that’s what the new collective agreement refers to as Hours of Equivalence. (Photo by Cyril Girard, gaffer, Wednesday 4 March)
Hollywood, Baïkal
Safy wanted to shoot in a cabin on the lake Baïkal. No way to separate the exteriors from the interiors. Therefore, after Arnaud, Nicholas and Bouriates had opened a road to make accessible a part of the lake that was not, Cyril, set designer, has conceived a series of boxes that allow us to shoot with long lenses, while staying warm and sheltered from a wind that sometimes blows very hard here. (Gilles Porte, Thursday 5 March)
Hollywood Baïkal (2)
The Teddy’s cabin boxes, photographed by whom has created them. (Photo by Cyril Gomez-Mathieu, set designer, Thursday 5 March)
Still there !
Today, as every time we go to "Teddy’s cabin", I’m passing by the shaman totem that Cyril and his team have planted on the first day of shooting. I wonder if Safy doesn’t add a headband of color every day when a new day begins to beg the evil spell. I have the feeling this false shaman totem will remain after we leave… (Gilles Porte, Friday 6 March)
Teddy and Aleskeï
“My two actors, after a day’s work.” (Photo by Safy Nebbou, director, Friday 6 March)
Control tower is out of order
Anne-Angèle is a data wrangler when she’s not a DJ on Saturday nights for the team. When we shoot by day, she manages backups, calibrates and color grades images, records QuickTime’s for the production and prints pictures, in her small lab set up on our island. For a few days now, her Apple (Panavision) station has broke down. Anne-Angèle is now facing screens that remain desperately black. That allows her to join us during the day as to work as an assistant camera on a B or even a C camera, or as to setup 2d unit shots we would have had great difficulty in filming, considering our schedule. (Gilles Porte, Saturday 7 March)
Ext-Int Day in – Video tent
The brightness and the transparency of the Lake Baikal are doubtless both things that most amazed me. I wonder what would give a night concert onto the frozen lake with only light sources… under the ice ! (Photo by Corinne Dubois, costume designer, Saturday 7 March)
(Translated from French by Laurent Andrieux)
- Click here to see the previous series of images (5th week).
- Click here to see the series of images from the 4th week.
- Click here to see the series of images from the 3rd week.
- Click here to see the series of images from the 2d week.
- Click here to see the series of images from the 1st week.
- Click here to find out more about Gilles Porte’s project, read a plot summary of the movie, learn about the members of the camera crew and some technical specifications.
