Taciturn, but with a sharp eye, Maigret is the protagonist of dozens of novels with often very dark plots. That of Maigret and the dead girl is no exception, although in his adaptation, Patrice Leconte lets in a little light. Simply titled Maigrethis most recent film is his second foray into the world of the prolific novelist after the remarkable Mr Hirereleased in 1989 and nominated seven times for the César.
“I had no conscious desire to return one day to Simenon for a film, except that, in life, he has accompanied me since adolescence”, confides Patrice Leconte, met during his visit to the festival. Fantasia, where is presented Maigret this Tuesday.
In his tender youth, in fact, the filmmaker spent his summer holidays with a grandmother who always had a pile of Simenon at hand. “That’s how I started to read them, first Maigrets, then his so-called ‘hard’ novels. At first, I was a little embarrassed, because it sounded less serious than reading, say, Chateaubriand. Then, a few years later in high school, in the final year, the philosophy teacher told us that we would study Descartes, Kant, etc., but that for him, the greatest philosopher remained Simenon. It has, as it were, legitimized my passion! » recalls Patrice Leconte.
Camped in the 1950s, Maigret sees the Commissioner attempt to identify a murdered young girl. The film, whose very neat cinematography by Yves Angelo (All the mornings of the world, Germinal) is dominated by blues, exudes an impression of icy melancholy, in contrast to the manifest — and rather unusual — empathy of the policeman.
matter of atmosphere
In the filmmaker’s opinion, Simenon is a formidable working companion. “He is very clean. He brilliantly sketches out very succinct but very evocative descriptions. It’s very cinematic. But at the same time, he can be a false friend, because it’s not so easy to adapt him: if we only stick to what happens, we miss it. You have to extrapolate, which is more complicated, but more exciting; manage to account for the feelings, the emotional charge, the atmosphere…”
Precisely, as the hallowed phrase goes, “Simenon is an atmosphere”. However, despite the pitfalls mentioned by the director, as well as the intangible nature of the so-called “Simenon” atmosphere, the fact is that the writer has been successfully adapted a significant number of times: from Julien Duvivier (Panic) to Claude Chabrol (The Hatter’s Ghosts, Betty), via Pierre Granier-Deferre (Cat, The Widow Couderc, The train, The Star of North) and of course Patrice Leconte, to name a few.
So many filmmakers very different from each other, and who have managed to appropriate Simenon without betraying him. So we come back to that famous “Simenon, it’s an atmosphere”. It is both very vague and very specific, and perhaps this paradox basically explains the singular adequation between Simenon and the 7e art. In that through his stripping, the author leaves a lot of latitude to the filmmakers.
A good example of this phenomenon is the novel The engagement ofMr Hireadapted by Duvivier under the title Panicand decades later, by me, with Mr Hire. When you look at them, they are two separate films, but from the same novel. »
Two distinct films, yes, and brilliant. Filigree, Panic deals with anti-Semitism, while Mr Hire is more of a film noir.
“Simenon’s writing is more allusive than directive; he is not an intrusive author. You can adopt it, adapt it, and make it your own. Moreover, when Jérôme Tonnerre [coscénariste à qui l’on doit entre autres Un coeur en hiver et Confidences trop intimes] and I showed our Maigret to John Simon [fils du romancier et coproducteur du film], he was delighted, even if we had taken a lot of liberties. He then said to us: “You have deviated a lot from my father’s novel, but without the novel, you could not have written this film.” »
One of these freedoms is certainly this “obvious and rather unusual empathy” displayed by the good commissioner. If he tries to give his name back to this “dead girl”, it is partly because his late daughter would have been the same age as her. Like this other young girl, who finds herself mixed up in the affair by the gang, and whom Maigret will take under his wing.
“In several of the novels that I reread when Jérôme and I were looking for which one we could adapt, Maigret is not very comfortable, both with his colleagues and with his spouse. In this novel, however, if he is initially jaded and tired, all that flies away with the investigation, which takes on a personal dimension. »
We are therefore entitled to poignant scenes, such as when Maigret questions a craftsman who has reported the disappearance of a young woman. On the surface, the process seems to have been wasted since it is not the same person, but in reality, the scene is fundamental on a dramatic, human level. “When you lose a child, you lose everything, there is nothing left, only the night,” says the man. To which the commissioner replies: “I know… I know. »
“I was not leading off, during the filming of this scene, remembers Patrice Leconte. Gérard Depardieu having himself lost a child, his son, Guillaume…”
Depardieu is Maigret
It is indeed Gérard Depardieu who embodies Maigret, a choice that makes sense: “I didn’t know when approaching him for the role, but Gérard is also a fan of Simenon. “Why didn’t anyone ask me to play Maigret before you?” he asked me. I like its immense presence, literally and figuratively; its fragility… Depardieu is like that in life. I love this big, battered guy. »
Nevertheless, from controversies to allegations of a sexual nature, are we now hesitating to hire the sacred monster?
“I heard about that, of course, but we say everything and its opposite about Depardieu. I’m not interested in getting into that. He’s a guy full of contradictions, but so talented and endearing… And it’s not about forgiving his weird political friendships, or forgiving what he’s accused of, turning a blind eye… I don’t want to take it into account of that — maybe I’m wrong — and deprive me of his talent. »
It is important to specify, moreover, that the film was shot while the investigation opened after a young actress, Charlotte Arnould, alleged that Depardieu had raped her had been dismissed by the Paris prosecutor’s office in 2019. It was not until the spring of 2022, after the film was released in France, that it was revealed that the actor had been indicted a year earlier for the same case.
Be that as it may, Patrice Leconte has no intention of embarking on a series of Maigrets: “One of the reasons why we chose this title, Maigret, it is precisely for the sake of suggesting a finality. »
However, a third adaptation by Simenon is not excluded: “It wouldn’t be a Maigret. But another of his novels? Who knows ! Perhaps what I like most about Simenon in the end is that he depicts normal people, onlookers, common folk; people who, a priori, have no history. But as soon as you start scratching a little…”
The film Maigret hits theaters July 29.