in the right direction 
 

PostED ON 20.10.2024

The actress, laureate of the 2024 Lumière Award, took her very first steps as director. Giving free rein to her imagination, she drew inspiration from a trip to Australia...

© Sandrine Thesillat

Nicoletta had it all wrong. The sun was not “on its last ray”. In fact, it started shining as brightly as ever yesterday afternoon when Isabelle Huppert was asked to take the director’s chair for the first time in her career. On this Saturday towards the end of the festival, the ritual demanded that the Lumière Award recipient get behind the camera to shoot a new remake of Leaving the Lumière Factories. At her disposal was a crowd of prestigious extras, regulars, gathered at the Hangar du Premier Film to listen to her directives. If cinema is all about trust, Isabelle Huppert, true to her independent spirit, opted to communicate her fears; unwillingly, of course: “It's the most difficult exercise I've ever done in my life. Because I have a theory: actors shouldn't have ideas”. “Nor should directors!” shouted Claire Denis, no doubt helping this newbie filmmaker to relax.

Obviously, Mademoiselle Huppert had carefully planned her subject. Her impetus was the memory of a scene witnessed in a remote area of Australia on a cold night “on a small island off the coast of Sydney”. It was a moment of Austral grace, described as “very mysterious, very beautiful, very moving”, during which... penguins emerged “one by one” from the sea until they formed a single unit. “The idea is that we see you clearly, without looking at the camera, but you must maintain the line” she specified, while setting the axis of the camera held by Gilles Porte.

Some may have remembered an interview with Madame Figaro in 2022: “I like to think that directors enjoy working with me, because I'm like their little object”. In the tightly packed rows of the Hangar, her ‘little objects’ were filled with a twinge of anxiety, already imagining their ducklike walks. “We're actually here for the remake of March of the Penguins,”, quipped one of the extras present, a well-known jokester, referring to Luc Jacquet's famous documentary featuring penguins in the starring role, but let’s move on...

© Sandrine Thesillat

The first take proved that Huppert would follow only her vision, without being hedged in by the rules. The Lumière brothers’ films were only 45 seconds long, a minute at the most. By the time Isabelle arrived, the last to walk through the factory door, it was close to two minutes. “She exploded the format”, Jean-Paul Salomé concluded. “Isabelle pulls a Chantal Ackerman on us, fascinating!” For the last two takes, the director for the day, megaphone in hand, urged everyone to “close the ranks”, “pick up the pace”, reminding them that “whatever happens”, they had to “maintain the line”.  Acting as Isabelle's first assistant director, Thierry Frémaux, behind the low wall, ensured that everyone complied with the filmmaker's instructions. After watching the films, the Institut Director felt that the third would be “the right one”, yet take two, despite its inaccuracies, had its charm...” Isabelle concurred. Cinema really is a team sport.

C.G.