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40 years after his death, Patrick Dewaere is reborn in a documentary co-directed by his daughter and Alexandre Moix, “Patrick Dewaere, my hero”. Lola tries to understand why her father, at the height of his glory, brutally ended his life on July 16, 1982.
In the documentary Patrick Dewaere, my hero, Lola Dewaere explores the flaws of her father, a free and wild actor who never knew how to heal his childhood wounds. A trying youth as an actor, and an abused childhood, smothered in a destructive family secret. Patrick Dewaere did not even think of remaining an actor. “[Il] hated acting, really. He had to, in fact, he had no choice. They were six children, and the parents who were unemployed threw their children on stage, selling them off in the flesh for a show”says Alexandre Moix, director and producer of the documentary Patrick Dewaere, my hero.
If he remains an actor, his real family will be that of the café-théâtre, a troupe where he meets Miou-Miou, his great love in the city and on the screen. Fragile and in search of the absolute, Patrick Dewaere puts himself in danger when his roles and his own life become one. He also feels a lack of recognition, as he is wooed to make the biggest movies and adored by audiences. On July 16, 1982, he repeated the promising role of Marcel Cerdan, for a film by Claude Lelouch, then returned home hastily. His wife would have left him for his best friend, Coluche. “He’s going to get the 22 Long Rifle that Coluche gave him, and he’s going to shoot himself in the mouth”says Engerrand Guépy, author of A wild beast (Ed. Le Rocher). Today, many actors still look at Patrick Dewaere as a model. They envy its intensity, but not its suffering.