For Mathieu Kassovitz and director Nicolas Giraud, “The Astronaut” speaks “above all of cinema”

Film of “scientific fiction” more than science fiction, according to Mathieu Kassovitz, which his partner and director Nicolas Giraud approves, The Astronaut hits theaters Wednesday, February 15. We met them to find out how this project was set up around the imaginary story of the first amateur manned space flight. What is their relationship to space, the subject of the film, what objectives did they want to achieve, and how did they proceed? So many questions that we ask ourselves when watching this ambitious film, unexpected in the French cinematographic landscape.

Franceinfo Culture: How did you meet on this slightly crazy project?

Nicholas Giraud: I first wrote this film for Mathieu. The role of Alexandre Ribbot (a space veteran) was for him, and I had direct access, since the producer of the film is Christophe Rossignon who notably produced Hatredby Mathieu, and others like Order and Morality. The scenario was submitted to him and his passion for space, linked to the pleasure he had in reading, meant that he joined me immediately in the adventure.

You weren’t born or were barely born at the height of space conquest in the 1960s (Mathieu Kassovitz was born in 1967 and Nicolas Giraud in 1978): how did this passion for space come to you?

Mathieu Kassovitz: But we had Challenger [la navette spatiale américaine qui a explosé au décollage en 1986 faisant sept morts], and the construction of the space station ISS thanks to the space shuttle. That was the conquest of space for me.

There was still less enthusiasm, going into space had become something normal. The name “shuttle” is in itself a trivialization, isn’t it?

Mathieu Kassovitz: Oh no ! The shuttle had relaunched the whole thing, we knew the launch date months in advance, it was an international event. It slowed down at the end, from the explosion of Challenger. But until Challenger, there was a launch every two years, at the time there was no other launcher, except Arianne, possibly, and the Russian Soyuz, but nothing else. It is today that there are launches every day. Now it’s several times a month, it’s amazing.

Nicholas Giraud: I am not like Mathieu passionate about the subject. What interests me in The Astronaut, is to talk about cinema. I obviously like, not what is called the conquest of space, but the space adventure. The Astronaut, it serves me above all to talk about my passion for cinema, and the space adventure is the absolute, it is the quest, not the conquest, of the absolute. With this story I have the perfect tools to talk about cinema, to share the taste for cinema. Because there is sound, another dimension to convey. Through the realization of his dream by the amateur astronaut in the film that I play, I talk about the process of making a film. It’s a mise en abyme, it’s a human adventure. The Astronautit is first of all the vision of an individual, the passion of an individual and the openness it provides by sharing it to bring together talents and energy, like for a film.

Mathieu Kassovitz: It is the fulfillment of a dream, whether for the astronaut or the director.

The participation of the ESA (European Space Agency) gives a scientific backing to the film, but is it realistic, or would you rather put it in the genre of science fiction?

Nicholas Giraud: It is totally realistic, it was my first wish. It’s really the first word that came to mind when I thought of the subject. I believe in the motricity of dreams, of things. That was the driving force of the film. What does realism go through? It goes through the presence of Jean-François Clairevoy, an astronaut with three stays in space, who becomes the film’s technical advisor, and through the association with the ArianeGroup company. In other words, sets, a site, things that we absolutely couldn’t afford to recreate with our budget and that really exist.

Concerning science fiction, I would take up Mathieu’s words which say that it is a “scientific fiction”. Which means that we did technical work upstream to make sure that what we were going to share with the public was not a documentary, but a cinema film, in which I use light, sound, the design… It is held together by a structured and functional statement. Even the XB3, the fuel to propel the rocket, a name that I invented, it is in fact a basic solid propellant that has been enriched with phosphorus. That, I asked one of Ariane’s pundits. What the hell could I put in the base mix to have enough power to launch a stageless rocket? He was the one who told me to add phosphorus. “It will be unstable, but you will have the power,” he told me. And it all happened like that.

Beyond the scientific aspect, let’s return to the human adventure, with the dramaturgy of the film, the countdown to the ultimate experience, with a whole range of characters, including the astronaut’s grandmother played by Hélène Vincent.

Nicholas Giraud: The rocket Ariane 6 has two boosters. A booster is Alexandre Ribbot (Mathieu Kassovitz), he is the one who will allow me to climb high by advising me. And the other is Jim’s grandmother, Hélène Vincent. It is love, it is presence. Jim (the astronaut) without his grandmother is not Jim, and Jim without Alexandre Ribbot is not Jim either. The same with Bruno Lochet (the chemist), the same with everyone. Without others, you cannot build yourself. A rocket, she needs that to have strength.

Mathieu, would you have liked to interpret the role of Jim played by Nicolas?

Mathieu Kassovitz: If I had directed the film yes. Playing the role and directing the film, the two come together in the project. The Astronaut talking about cinema, as Nicolas said, both have the same dream, that of launching a rocket and launching a film. It wouldn’t make sense for someone else to play the role. For any director in the world, knowing that it is the director who plays in his film, it is folded: we are talking about cinema. This is his fight.

The Astronaut is a story about men, but women are very important in the film, how did you conceive of their role?

Nicholas Giraud: They are not withdrawn. For me, the men in the film are feminine and the women in the film are masculine. And my work has always been to consider femininity in men and masculinity in women. Myself, when I was only an actor, I cherished my femininity and it was even she who brought me virility. It’s not for nothing that I choose a young Franco-Japanese girl by asking her to have very short hair (Ayumi Roux in the role of a mathematician). There is no border for me. Femininity feeds masculinity and vice versa. It’s like humility and ambition. It takes humility when you realize The Astronaut and it also takes ambition. It’s not paradoxical, I weld the two. We also talk about women who in the film are of different ages. One is twenty years old and the other nearly eighty, and both are equally alive and equally necessary to the success of the enterprise. That’s all I believe in: transmission, transgenerational, sharing, hybridization. These are all terms of energy.