Filmmakers, by nature, are often passionate about 7e art. Normal. This explaining that, it happens that they want to shoot a film about cinema. Billy Wilder with Sunset Blvd. (Dusk Boulevard), Stanley Donen and Gene Kelly with Singin’ in the Rain (Let’s sing in the rain), Jean-Luc Godard with ContemptFrançois Truffaut with The American nightMike Nichols with Postcards from the Edge (Hollywood Kisses) and Robert Altman with The Player (The leader) are among the directors who offered an affectionate, introspective or satirical look at their milieu. In this regard, Michel Hazanavicius has already given with his award-winning The Artist (The artist). However, here it is which repeats with Cut!.
Unveiled at Cannes, this latest comedy from the director ofOSS 117. Cairo, nest of spies is in this case a remake from the Japanese film of 2017 Don’t cut!by Shin’ichiro Ueda.
“The context in which I saw this film was unusual, insofar as I was immediately offered to make a remakethis even though I was working on a comedy project camped during the shooting of a film”, explains Michel Hazanavicius, who came to promote Cut! to Montreal.
“I kinda knew what to expect, but I was surprised. I watched it with Bérénice [Bejo, avec qui le cinéaste est en couple de longue date] without telling her anything about the film and, initially, she was completely dumped. It was very funny to watch his reaction. »
In fact, during the first half hour of Cut!, we witness the nightmarish filming of a Z-zombie movie in which the team is suddenly attacked by “real” zombies. Everything may well be filmed in a single sequence shot, but what we see is a priori disconcertingly outdated. However, as we discover a posteriori, it was on purpose, since it was in reality a simulacrum, Cut! recounting the shooting of a film which is itself about the shooting of a film. You follow ? Think American Night (of the Living Dead). “I found the structure brilliant. »
On the other hand, Michel Hazanavicius hesitated to keep the zombies for the metafilm, juggling with the idea of telling the filming of the filming of a “more typically French thing”.
“A film d’auteur not caricatural, but which we have seen often, like ‘reunion in the family home on the death of one of the parents’. Except that the zombies lent themselves perfectly to the context of a broke shoot, a little Z. And then, there was this spectacular, outrageous side, in the bloody effects, which made me laugh. »
This notion of discrepancy
Shin’ichirô Ueda’s film also covered many themes that Michel Hazanavicius wanted to address in the other comedy project he was thinking of, in particular teamwork in the cinema. However, the aspect that appealed to him more was what he calls the notion of “gap” which, according to him, prevails between the public and people in the cinema.
“I mean that in general, people who don’t work in cinema only remember the final result of the film, and that’s normal. But when you make films, it’s a human adventure in which you always give the best of yourself. Now, a film is futile — a really useful and necessary film, one comes out every I-don’t-know-when. Essentially, we want to entertain, move, make people laugh, scare: these are small emotions that we offer people, but it is not serious or important, in the end. And this discrepancy, therefore, is that what we put into this futile little thing is an enormous investment; it is faith. This idea, it seemed to me that this film managed to express it with a lot of humor and tenderness. »
As Don’t cut!, Cut! is divided into three parts. The first shows the film within the film, that is to say the fictional shooting which itself relates a shooting, while the second part goes back and tells the preparations while providing more information on the various characters. . Note that Nadia, Rémi’s actress spouse, and Romy, their aspiring director daughter, will find themselves involved in the adventure, with, among others, a temperamental young actor, another alcoholic, a more or less talented actress-influencer, a cameraman macho, etc.
Finally, the third part follows the team behind the camera as everyone scrambles to achieve the famous sequence shot, which is, to add to the ambient pressure, broadcast live on a digital platform.
“The film within the film was shot in sequence, which required weeks of preparation. On the last day, towards the end of the last take, which was the good one, at about 25 minutes out of the 30 that the shot lasts, the red light came on: the camera’s memory card had not been loaded sufficiently . »
A human error that, come to think of it, is perfectly in tune with the story.
Four levels of “meta”
Be that as it may, making a film that talks about cinema, but which is moreover a remake in which the characters themselves turn a remake, isn’t this, basically, the height of metacinema? In this regard, we are entitled to the participation of Yoshiko Takehara, who is taking over the role of producer that she had created in Don’t cut!.
“There are better ! launches Michel Hazanavicius. At one point during filming, there was a documentary crew shooting a making of, so there were then four cameras for four levels of mise en abyme, with them filming us filming the actors playing a team that shoots a film relating the shooting of a film. »
For the account, Michel Hazanavicius goes even further than the original in his version since, apart from his nested treatment of the concept of remake, he gives a personal dimension to his film. Thus the character of the camera assistant who saves the day is played by her niece Raïka Hazanavicius. As for that of Romy, the aspiring director daughter of Rémi and Nadia, he is embodied by his own daughter, Simone Hazanavicius (born of a first union with the director Virginie Lovisone).
It is Romy who finds in extremis an alternative solution for the final shot which, without revealing anything, illustrates with marvelous simplicity and eloquence the collaborative nature of cinema.
“This final shot with Simone, I did a lot for myself, I admit. My daughter wants to write and direct herself, like the character, who is the daughter of a director… The latter’s actress spouse is played by my actress spouse, Bérénice… It’s difficult to do more metacinema. At the same time, I believe that I made this film to say thank you to all the people with whom I have collaborated over time. This film is a love letter. »
The film Cut! hits theaters October 21