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2011 Festival Feature Films (March 24-27)

French director Fabienne Berthaud presents Pieds nus sur les limaces

director Fabienne Berthaud screenplay Fabienne Berthaud, Pascal Arnold starring Diane Kruger, Ludivine Sagnier, Denis Menochet, Brigitte Catillion, Jacques Spiesser, Anne Benoît, Jean-Pierre Martins, Reda Kateb, Gaëtan Gallier, Côme Levin, Arthur Orcier, Mathias Meloul running time 1 h 48 min parental guidance

Synopsis

Lily is like no other girl. She lives in a whimsical world in harmony with nature in the middle of the countryside at her mother’s house. Her elder sister, Clara, is married to a young lawyer who has a bright future; she lives and works in a big city far from home. When their mother dies, Clara must turn her life upside down in order to take care of Lily. Influenced by her sister, Clara starts questioning her own life values and enjoying a new freedom.

director/screenwriter
Fabienne Berthaud

actresses
Diane Kruger

Ludivine Sagnier

Interview with Fabienne Berthaud

When did you get the idea for Pieds nus sur les limaces?
I wrote the book while I was shooting my first feature film, Frankie. The young girl who inspired Lily’s character spent some time in the clinic where I was filming. So it came as a logical conclusion to my work. The whimsical nature of the spirit, reaching one’s outer limits, looking at peoples’ vulnerability and their differences, are all recurrent themes in my work.

What touched you about this young girl?
Her freedom, her capacity to live for the moment. I like people who do not fit into a mold. They have a strong sensibility and it keeps them from accepting the rules of society that seem arbitrary. Lily’s character pushes the envelope of normality and makes us question how we live, while offering other possibilities for those who do not fit into the “format.” Lily won’t compromise. She is free in body and spirit and she will not negotiate. She shakes people up and makes them question reality. The story breaks into our personal world and forces us to question the fine line between what is normal and what is offbeat.

Is it easy to adapt your own novel?
It is essential to take a step back. I do not remember who said, “One must look at literature with a filmmaker’s eye and not try to reproduce it.” With my co-screenwriter, Pascal Arnold, we felt entirely free. We were very playful while writing some of the dialogue. Lily, with her frankness and her ability to tell people what she thinks without any restriction, allowed us to use some offbeat humor. I think this is a great strength in the film. In fact, in the final analysis, if the book is very dark, the film is very sunny and veers toward hope. That is precisely what interested me when I started this project. Taking the same characters and having them experience other situations.

How would you define your film?
It is a story about a family. Two sisters, vulnerable due to the sudden death of their mother, find each other. Both of them are out of balance, each in her own way. Their lives are in turmoil and they will mutually learn from each other and grow. I tried to tell a story of humanity, generosity, love and freedom. It is about understanding the other with her/his differences.

What made you think of casting Diane Kruger, your heroine in Frankie, for the role of Clara, Lily’s older sister?
I did not think about it. It just happened. It became an obvious fact, a desire. It was out of the question that I make my second feature film without her. She read the book. I asked her, “Would you like to play Clara?”She said yes, and that was it. She followed the various versions of the script. We wanted to work with each other again. She is part of my universe, my life, my family. I love looking at her through my camera lens. She inspires me. She is vulnerable and strong at once. I love that duality. She is capable of expressing things in silence with a lot of subtlety. We have known each other for several years now, and we started together because Frankie was like a first film for both of us. She knows the way I work and we do not need to talk very much to understand each other. She knows what I expect from her and I know what she expects from me. We have a mutual respect for one another. Clara’s is a difficult role to play, restrained, subtle and delicate. She is a character battling an inner storm that she cannot express. Until one day when …

Why did you choose Ludivine Sagnier to play the role of Lily?
Lily’s character is extremely complex. She should never appear ridiculous. She flirts with insanity, but she should not be taken for a “rain woman.” It was essential to find an actress whose child-like quality was still palpable, someone who projects pureness, truth, while being generous at the same time. She is a multifaceted character. There is no compromising when you accept a role like that. You must give your all. It is a role that demands considerable work without it showing. Ludivine was an obvious choice. I felt she was capable. When I saw her for the audition, the moment she opened the door, I knew she would be perfect. She has a woman-child quality, an authentic aura. I do not know how to explain it. I function instinctively. I do not intellectualize anything. I only sense things. And she also really wanted to play the character, which came across to me as well. She had the urge and so did I. I had her meet Diane. I needed to see them together to feel if they would get along, love each other. There was an instant connection and it turned out having them play two sisters, physically, really worked. During the shooting, there was a strong complicity between them. They were really like two sisters and very attentive to one another. Ludivine is an actress who gives all of herself without any restrictions. She works without a safety net. She does not act, she is. She never cheats and is very generous. She has the ability to forget herself and take on another persona to the point of physically changing. It is a joy to work with her, and I am sure that Lily will surprise many people. I feel like I have always known her. She is like a little sister to me. I do not know … like Diane. I feel the same attachment. My family is growing.

How did your experience of working on Frankie help you in filming Pieds nus sur les limaces and how do you work?
I feel that each film has its own syntax. I think that Pieds nus sur les limaces is my second first feature. In fact, during the shooting, Diane kidded me and said, “Fabienne, we are making a real film with a crew.” It is true, on Frankie, the crew was made up of an assistant who held the microphone and me with a digital camera that I used like a pen. That was all. And that reflected the mode of the film. For Pieds nus sur les limaces, things were different. All cinematographic tools were available to me, as well as a full technical crew, although I made a point to keep it as light as possible. I need freedom to work. I do not cut, freeze or frame. If I am not in the eye of the camera, I cannot feel the scene that I am shooting. It all goes through it. The film is made in the moment. When I begin shooting a scene, I am in a state of high alert. I am uncomfortable and I feel in danger. I search for the unexpected, the miracle, the moment of grace. I do not prepare anything, but I know perfectly well where I am going and what I want to obtain because I have mulled it over in advance. I also have the annoying tendency to talk during the takes. I direct actors in this manner and we virtually never rehearse beforehand. And I always say, “Tell your story as if you’re making a documentary about people.” I had to find people who agreed to work in this manner, people capable of setting aside their reflexes and habits so they could use mine. I put together my crew in the same way as I did my actors. Intuitively, I let my instincts guide me. The people with whom I decide to work must have human qualities. It is as essential as their talent. I cannot work with difficult personalities, no matter how wonderful they may be. I need to create with pleasure, and I am very uncomfortable with tension. Finally, my work is about bringing together talent that adds to the whole, while letting each person express their skills to make the most beautiful film possible whether it is sound, image, set, editing, calibration, mixing. … It all counts.

How did things go with your director of photography, Nathalie Durand?
I was very frightened to work with a cinematographer. I was afraid there would be too many projectors, too much machinery, too many constraints that would keep us from changing the trajectory of  the camera when I wanted it. And we filmed with two cameras, which is not necessarily simple. When I met Nathalie, I told her, “I don’t want light.” It seems a rather paradoxical request to make to a cinematographer. But she understood what I wanted, and she set herself up to work in the manner I requested. The camera crew was made up of three people. We used a handheld camera, which provided a lot of flexibility. We filmed the exterior shots working with the sun. For the interiors, she did her job without questioning mine. And I am grateful to her. We worked in symbiosis to such a point that each evening when we would look at the rushes, we could hardly tell which one of us set up the shot. When it gets to that point, the working conditions are exceptional. Having the same vision for the shots is something else!

Another essential element of the film is linked to Lily’s world. How did you construct it?
When I was writing it, I met the artist, Valérie Delis, whose artistic creations corresponded to Lily’s world. She is very close to animals and nature. Without even knowing if the film was going to be made, we decided to work together. She opened her artist’s studio to me and I let myself be sucked up in her whimsical world, rewriting certain scenes for the script after seeing what she had to show me. We discussed Lily’s vision of the world together … the way she dresses, creates. We made working notebooks. Valérie quickly started to create Lily’s aprons, her slippers. She made Lily’s garden and lent her own works for the girls’ rooms. I suggested she do Lily’s installations in the forest. She decorated trees, constructed, invented, enriched Lily’s world, and many shots and special moments in the film are coming from this pre-production period. Once the film was financed, I asked her to be the artistic director. She accepted. She had never worked in cinema before.

Are there certain films or filmmakers that had been a reference for you when you started working on Pieds nus sur les limaces?
Mostly photography. I depend a great deal on this tool to find my film. Scenes, framing. I make notebooks of images that I flip through before shooting each scene. But before each film, I must admit I see John Cassavetes’ movies again. I feel as though he is whispering in my ear, “Go on, go for it. Feel free. Do not listen to them. There are no rules except yours.” It has that affect on me. It keeps me from being frightened.

Did the way you directed your actors change on this second feature-length film?
I do not like the word directing. I do not think I direct. I feel that when the actors are in their right place, there is nothing more to be done. There is only something to be collected. I do not think a film can have bad actors. It is more that the director has made poor choices. He is the one who has made the mistake, not the actor. Prior to shooting, we talk at length with the actors about the story of the characters. They ask me questions. We search together. But once we are on the set, they are free to do as they wish, as long as it is what I am expecting. And most importantly, I do everything I can so that the real spark of life comes together with fiction. For instance, Denis Ménochet, who plays Pierre, never filmed several days in a row with us. I did everything in my power so he would not find his place on the set … in the same way that his character is incapable of finding his place between Clara and Lily.

Do you rewrite much of the film during the post-production and editing?
I write it differently. I forget about the script. At this point, it no longer serves any purpose. The only things that count are the characters, their emotions, their internal journeys, what they experience and the rhythm. Editing is difficult because you have to get rid of certain moments that you loved, certain dialogue, certain sets … and considering the way I film, I end up with a lot of rushes. I have a lot of scenes I must bury. However, at a certain point of the editing, the film speaks for itself. At this point, cutting scenes no longer hurts. Instead, it feels good, very good, because the film is finding its rhythm, its storyline, its emotion. It is finding its coherence, harmony and “music.”

There is definitely a mixture in Pieds nus sur les limaces between emotion, laughter and uneasiness, which in fact keeps us from putting the film in a specific genre.
If this film is like Lily and does not fit into any pigeonhole, I am delighted. Whether it be Anglo-Saxon, German or French, as long as it has its humanity, coherence, makes you want to live and speaks to people, that’s the only thing that counts.

In your film Frankie, you introduced us to the group Coco Rosie. How did you come up with music for Pieds nus sur les limaces?
During the editing, I began to think about the music, but I did not know exactly where to begin. There was just one thing I was sure of. I wanted to use a Thomas Dybdhal song for the end of the film. He is a young Norwegian musician with a lot of talent. And then, through a friend, I met Michael Stevens, who did the music for the last three Eastwood films: Letters From Iwo Jima, Gran Torino and Invictus. He told me he was moving to Paris. I spoke to him about the film. He asked me to show him some images. I felt his curiosity. One day, he came to the editing room with his guitar, a synthesizer … He sat in front of the screen and started to play. His instruments never left the room after that.

Michael set up a studio in the cellar of the production office and the editing studio became a music studio as well. He composed some songs little by little that he then recorded in Budapest. It was a fantastic experience. Some of his friends joined in, people like Manu Katché, Kyle Eastwood, Crofton Orr and Scott Barnhill.

Do you prefer literature or cinema?
I like them both! I need one to make the other. They echo each other. I find my film subjects in my novels. And ideas for novels in my films.