Vanitas

I look at the vanitas works. I love the idea of Damien Hirst, this dialogue with diamonds, that stuff about jewel, completely vain precisely, and also... "immortal" ... no... "eternal", right?

I also like very much the Jan Fabre's one, its arrogance, its vitality ...

Yet I have something else in mind. Something simple. I feel that facing death ought to be delirious, since death doesn't even exist as an entity ...

I don't know. Skulls seem to be already inflated by a lot of... how can I say... projections... It could be interesting to calm it down... Don't add in delirium and anxiety... strip it... clear up the force of it...

My effort will consist in not deploying efforts, such as proving that I exist. I'll try that. It can even be quite exciting ...

Dinner at Sébastien Meunier's

I am invited to dinner at Sebastian. I do not know him. I know he has a delirious imagination and can be deliciously provocative.

I arrive. I talk about the project. I don't need to say much about it that he's already up. I smiled.

He shows me photos and videos of his collections. He is intimidated a bit, very slightly nervous. He get confused with the technical support, presses every single button on his computer, everything disappears. Frozen screen. He presses all other buttons: it works.

I watch. I'm not helpful: I don't say anything. Not a word. I am very curious and very amused by the tricks that I see though. I realize that I'm silent for a while, I finally force myself to say something, I do not know what: "cool" or "I love it" or ... whatever ... Something encouraging. I notice a trench-coat on which is flocked the definition of the word "exhibitionist". I want for my film.

Let's eat something now. The cook is very simple and delicate : fresh pasta with parmesan cheese, a trickle of olive oil and salad. Sébastien changes his outfit at each dish. He plays like a mischievous and slightly perverse child. It amuses me. He is a little worried by my amusement. He did not know if I'm just indifferent. But no, I like him for sure. Everything is fine.

A guest talk about my project: "Yes, because in this film by Catherine Breillat, it turns out the actress is very uncomfortable..." I say "Yes, that's what interests me, shooting this embarrassment... I don't want us to act as if everything was fine, if it's not..." His look seem thoughtful...

We keep talking for a while. The evening is ending....

They make something so delicious, Sebastian and his circle, something "huysmansian". They know perfectly the rules of etiquette, good taste, refinement, sophistication, but they don't respect them, they are respected by them.

Mood:

A working session with Natal

We often meet with Natal to take bearings.

She has already receives many, many different versions of the script.

She carefully keeps up with the progress step after step. She surprisingly even remember sometimes a detail of a previous version.

She is not intrusive. She lets me do things in my way.

And sometmes, she points out something which doesn't seem clear or precise enough. Or she raises a question about something I knew I should work harder on.

She gives no clue. She doesn't interfere. She just underlines in a really gentle and relevant way.

She doesn't express what she prefers. It's up to me to guess so far: no too much theory, no unnecessary provocation, no unnecessary delicacy either... that kind of things.

There are things she is the only one to know, some anecdotes, some secrets ... There are also things that even she doesn't know.

We meet quiet often. In the beginning we tried a new café each time. We landed in more than a dozen. Than we get accustomed to sitting outside one café with trees all around.

Throughout our meetings, she speaks and listens without any notes, no paper, nothing. It looks like she came without preparing anything.

She does not rush me.

I talk a lot. I happen to think I talk too much. I don't let her enough room.

I often ask het to be more specific.

At the end of a meeting, I often say: "something else?" And this is at this very precise moment that every time she takes out a pile of papers covered with her notes. She glances through it to check if she hasn't forgotten something: "We saw that ... we did it ... ah yes, this!..."

For a long time, more than a year, we don't speak about something else than our project or cinema. We have no idea of who we are, what we live, how we deal with stuff.

And litlle by little, we drop some anecdotes. We get more confomrtable. At one moment, she is talking about her and suddenly stops: "You never get personal, don't you? I smile.

We get to know each other.

Mood:

Firts pages of the story-board

I ended a first story-board.

I took the opportunity to test many things.

I want a distance between the camera and the actors:
- with static, long shots which look like a watercourse somehow, something going on at his own rhythm
- with the work on lights and shadows, you may feel embrace by something really intimate with such a delicacy
- and with the progress of the camera, discovering step by step the room.

I don't want to show or show off. I want things to take place and the camera will happen to catch it or not.

I want to play with desire, lacks and needs of the images. To move forward the look and to make up needs.

Here are the first two pages of the story-board:



























Mood:

Porn scenes in mainstream movies

Today, I sent a Myspace bulletin to all the movie-goers:

"For my research, I need to watch a maximum of mainstream films in which directors have shot... how to say?: Sex.

So I have seen Intimacy, the Breillat's movies, fuck me, 9 songs, Destricted, I have not seen the brown bunny because I remember it pretty well, I also have Pola X in mind, and some others ...

If you have any suggestions, movies to advise, please ...

Thank you

ps: I add a photo of a beautiful film to brighten my bulletin. "



Here are the answers I got:

• "Most of the movies featuring Béatrice Dalle; the Larry Clarks, Going Places (les valseuses); Sitcom by Ozon (If I remember well...); Color of Night with Bruce Willis, there's a quiet porn version; the Morrisseys (Warhol), there's also something I remember when I was a teenager Rai about the suburbs with Tabatha Cash; iku a japanese movie; Miike (Visitor Q), the Bruce LaBruces mmmmmhHere is a few... I will try to go on...
  this is a subject I'm interested in beautiful Claude Pérèss to whom I have never spoken maxime "

• "Caligula, Ken Park, Niht Porter... Enjoy your research; there's more..."

• "Boogie Nights ?"

• "You have to see "Shortbus" by John Cameron Mitchell; its prior title was "The Sex Film Project", so... I was tolds there's sex in "Lie With Me", but I didn't see it yet. I like this young actor Eric Balfour.

thank your for your message. Interesting subject.

Sushuma"

• "Damage (fatale) by Louis Malle, yes I know, it sucks..."

• "- ken park by larry clark
  - irréversible (but this is rather a rape...)"

• "What do you mean by sex scenes? seeing a cock or a pussy?
I'm thinking about Life of Jesus by Bruno Dumont.
Crame"

• Dammit, as a result I watched your movies and I wanna say they are fucking good
so bravo then
because really!

• "I suggest you to watch In the realm of the senses; Last Tango in Paris; Boogie Nights; eyes wide shut; shortbus; basic instinct; My man.
Tell me if it helps
Have a nice weekend
Cedric"

• "You have to see BACKSTAGE, a short by Camille Vidal Naquet. Gaspard."

• ""shortbus, ken park, time to leave, all the pasolinis... enjoy ;) "

• "ozon with the stricker dildo for stephane rideau, pierre erwann guillaume and aurelien decoing in Natural ennemy, Devil in the flesh by bellochio, nine songs by michael W....
  what a shame you don't do the opposite, mainstream in porn movies...
  
  twinsen"

I would add : Andy Warhol's shorts, "Blow Job" for instance, really clever ; some Richard Kern's movies, full of energy ; some Johnny Terris'...

I retain : 9 songs because of the lights and the acting, Intimacy because of the picture... and in an other kind : The Embryo Hunts In Secret by Koji Wakamatsu because it happens behind closed doors ; and Mystery Train because of the shooting script of the first part in the room.

What about you? Did you see some of them? Others?

Meeting Natal

I received a message from Natal, who produced, with Hystery prod, "One Night Stand" by Emilie Jouvet. She just saw my film "Missed" in a festival. She loved it. Good thing, I want to work with this production... We decided to meet.

This is the night. We meet in a café. I arrive the first. I choose a quiet place. I would be more comfortable if everyone did not hear what I have to tell.

She arrives. She is very gentle, very simple. A child's face, the oval quite rounded, the eyes slightly restrained. She looks a bit naive. The voice quiet and pretty safe. I assume she must be stubborn sometimes.

We talk a little. She spoke of "Missed", of my voice. I smiled. I want to say : "yes, I'm an actor too", but I say nothing.

She seems impatient to begin. I'm pretty sure she is going to ask what we are waiting when I say: "We order our coffee and then we start, ok?". It answered the question she was close to ask. I see it in her way to nod.

We smiled.

People come sit next to us. I wanted to be quiet ... Too bad.

I take my step outline and I begin to read. Here I come in a tunnel over an hour during which I read, I punctuate, I explain. I am alone here. I'm slogging a bit. But her enthusiastic reactions, her pensive air, her playful eyes encourage me. It seems to ring a bell to her.

She listened, asked for details and does not say what she really thinks. But she seems to understand the need I have to try to get onto sex in a different way, to use dark and light and to try to conceive an other method of work, for artistic and political reasons.

I also show her notes, plans of all colors that I use to work on the rhythm ... It amuses her.

She asks me what I need. I said, "no money, it is important to make a film without money, to see what can be done without resources. The resources are something for lazy people who believe that it replaces work. No, I need a look from the outside to write and then to be supported for the production or distribution... "

I have the feeling that I was able to share my enthusiasm, and actually I am genuinely enthusiastic.

Now I'm tired.

She will think about it. We are done for this time.

Mood:

Preliminary draft

I wrote a step outline. This is a very detailed plan or a short script.

I happened to do it quickly. I had already a lot of images in mind.

The framework and the rhythm are quiet classical : it begins with a catch line: they fuck; then happens an obstacle: they don't desire each other; a long time in the dark with a work on the lights; after they play around, come closer or move away from each other...

The device is precise, a thread unrolling throughout the film and many improvised things.

It works as a trail, dotted with milestones. The actors are up to go around, spontaneously.

Mood:

Appetite #3

I would like to use the dark.

I sense it could allow me to raise many questions with images.

It could be very strong...

Appetite #2

I want to make a movie about the body.

Sex seems to me a really rich subject to explore.

I need to go through, raise and use all the questions it asks.

It can be perilous. Critical.

Almost everything has to be done.

This is stirring.

Appetite/starting point

I directed several short movies, in which I try to catch something happening rather than making it up.

I want to go much further.

How can I go about it? How put together an actor, a crew, some cameras, a place without knowing beforehand what is going to happen?

Moreover, how could even anything happen, since we all know everything stops when a camera is turned on?

Mood: