The screen opens on a bland, sage green wall, crossed on the left by a ray of light, which we can imagine emanating from a window. For long seconds that stretch lazily, the camera seems motionless. Then, we discern a movement, a progressive retreat. Quietly, this rear traveling reveals a medical bed, surmounted by a triangle of gallows, on which a man, lying down, gently wakes himself from sleep.
This scene, which lasts almost five minutes, sets the tone of You’ll never know, fifth feature film by filmmaker and actor Robin Aubert. The film tells the daily life of Paul Vincent, an octogenarian isolated in the room of a residence for the elderly during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“This first shot was made with the very rebellious perspective of embarking fully on a continuous film, which focuses on a single day in the life of an old man confined between four walls,” maintains the director. Subconsciously, I think it’s a form of courtesy, a way of telling viewers that they have the chance to leave now if they’re not ready for the experience. I wanted to create a sort of vortex with this scene, so that those who pass it agree to stay with the protagonist until the end. »
“We asked ourselves if we were capable of convincing the public to watch something that we would all prefer to forget, because it is too recent,” explains Julie Roy, who co-wrote the film with Robin Aubert, with whom she also shares his life. Ultimately, we got caught at our own game. We put so much love into this character that, even when writing, we surprised ourselves by wanting to stay with him. We wanted to tell what seniors experienced from a fictional perspective to go beyond statistics and reach people. »
The role of a lifetime
Thus, Paul Vincent’s day is made up of routines, habits, hope, waiting and repetitions. The minutes pass between the bed and the armchair, in a boredom and solitude only interrupted by tasteless meals of dubious texture, brief exchanges with overwhelmed nursing staff, birdsong recorded on a tape recorder, photos of his loved ones and the coughing fits of his roommate. Through this monotony, Mr. Vincent dreams of finding his sweetheart, who has been put on another level without him being able to visit her.
The film team called on Martin Naud, an 88-year-old non-professional actor who shouts the truth, to play the main character. “I had first imagined Jean Lapointe in the role, but he was too ill. Then I called Yvon Deschamps, who told me he was retired. I had eliminated all options in my head and heart. Then, when the idea of a non-professional actor came up, there was no turning back. I didn’t want it to become a performance film. I wanted people to believe in it, to be carried by the emotion and the experience, and that would not have been possible with Rémy Girard,” says Robin Aubert.
The producers and screenwriters therefore received dozens of videos from octogenarians ready to try something new. “It was really touching. In Martin, we found a panache, an energy perceptible through fragility. He was extraordinary,” remembers Julie Roy.
Martin Naud may never have done theater, but he led an existence worthy of a film. “I started working very young, first with farmers, then as showboy in a logging camp, as a log driver and as an electrician. It allowed me to marry the most wonderful woman in the world, who gave me six beautiful children. Then, I taught in a village school, like Émilie Bordeleau, when I was only in tenth grade. Then I joined the police. »
“All my life, I have thrived on challenges. Cinema is one more. I am also proud, and I told Robin, who has become like a brother to me, to participate in a project which bears witness to our history and which will still have value in fifty years. »
Love above all
Carried by the play of sincerity and dazzling simplicity of Martin Naud, You’ll never know works miracles with next to nothing. By embracing the inner life and physical limitations of its protagonist, the bold and intelligent staging as well as the minimalist and stifling decor offer an edifying commentary on the state of our health system, emphasizing the importance of nursing staff and volunteers who operate there in execrable conditions as well as the consequences of isolation.
“It was not our intention to make a political film. As a filmmaker, I still wanted to spend time filming a face and only a face, to explore the skin, the energy, the quirks of a character,” explains the filmmaker. “From the start, we talked about the concept of choreographing the void. It allowed us to understand that the void, deep down, is not empty at all, that it is filled with small things which can be as banal as they are fascinating,” adds Julie Roy.
“I often came back with the idea of choreographing time. There is a malleable and existentialist, almost random aspect to time, which is difficult to transpose to the screen. I find it a great laboratory to try to summarize an entire day in an hour and a half,” continues Robin Aubert.
To place the spectator in the head of his character, to reflect his immobility, the latter stretches the fixed shots and traveling shots to the limit, creates a feeling of latency, of waiting, interrupted here and there by a human interaction and exacerbated by lighting changes that simulate the progression of the day.
“I didn’t want to do hyperrealism. I visited nursing homes while making this film, and you can’t believe what I saw. I wouldn’t have been able to film a place so ugly, so narrow, so dreary. The room in which Paul performs is beautiful, almost theatrical. Light, in my opinion, brings a poetic touch and becomes like a real character, an interaction between the protagonist and life. »
This poetry is also in the image of the film. Because if Robin Aubert tells a tragic story, he stays far from the miserabilism and lack of agency often associated with old age. Paul Vincent, before being cut off from the world by the pandemic, had managed to reinvent himself, to give meaning to his life, to increase his hobbies, in addition to investing in a new romantic relationship. “I’ve never loved like that,” he says, speaking of his sweetheart, whom he will try by all means to find again, in a final sequence with a Hitchcockian feel which reflects Robin Aubert’s passion for genre films. .
“That doesn’t mean we’re in denial. There are hard moments, moments that force us to face our mistakes, but this film is above all a story of experience, of emotion; a love story,” concludes the director.
The film You’ll never know hits theaters on March 15.