Petit Bulletin SAINT-ETIENNE-Cinéma Saint-Etienne: adieu Monsieur Haffmann-Fred Cavayé: "I have self-censored myself a little in order not to fall into plagiarism"-article published by Vincent Raymond

What led you to approach this subject and this era?

Fred Cavayé: Lots of things: the desire dates for a very long time. The starting point is a novel by Michel Audiard, the night, the day and all the other nights that talks about the liberation and in particular women who are mowing. The bastards under the Occupation, it is a subject that had been quite little addressed. I had the memory of films like Lacombe Lucien or the great TV movie with good butter with Roger Hanin. So when Jean-Philippe Daguerre, the author of the Farewell play Mr. Haffmann sent me the text, I did not want to read it (I would prefer to discover the play once mounted), I made my story With the little I knew. Now his play is elsewhere, in truth, not on the subject. As I am lucky to have good producers and to be a friend with Jean-Philippe Daguerre for a long time, I offered to adapt in a perhaps more free way by having the character played by Gilles deviate from Lellouche towards a very dark side. It is not the autopsy of a bastard, but the drift of a character who, not by ideology but by bait of gain or to succeed in having things that he does not, will take advantage of the situation Until becoming dangerous ... and a real bastard - I have no other word; If you have another one, I'm ready to take it!

A coward ?

He is a character who has no chance, that his claudication prevented his homeland from defending and who finds the opportunity, for a good cause, to help his boss and to rise socially.Besides, the character for whom we have the least empathy is his wife who is afraid of doing something criminal so very dangerous at the time.And Gilles brings this terribly human thing: it does not become a cinema monster, but a low -end bastard.What I wanted to deal with from the start.

The evolution of the character is to the exact opposite of that of Mr. Klein, but their end destiny is not so far away ...

When I started working, I didn't want to see Mr. Klein (nor Lacombe Lucien) again.I had to see him 25 years ago;I had memories of the station stage at the end - so I prohibited myself from making a station scene for example.Like the stove thing which reminded me of the hole of the blower in the last metro: I was a little self-censored so as not to fall into plagiarism.I even asked my agent to review the last metro to tell me if there were things that were too resonated.When I made action movies, or for the game which was a closed -door comedy, I did not review from closed -closed comedies.For at close range, I had not seen Marathon Man where a gentleman-tut-le-world is forced to run to save his skin.So for Haffmann, it was a bit the same thing: I banned the camera and the films of this period.

Precisely, did your experience on the game allow you to slip more easily towards a closed-door staging and, additional layer, did the confinement have an impact?

Often - all the time - the films that I make will trigger the film after.For Haffmann, fortunately I had played the game because I learned in staging the pitfalls of the closed door!This is a ten times more complicated exercise than four cameras movies, where you sauté a TGV.In a closed door, narrative things quickly become ostentatious: the slightest movement of the camera takes up huge proportions and highlights everything.Here, it allowed me to go to the bone, mainly to the service of the actors, so that the story that is telling is a beyond the dialogues, in their eyes.And we are with them, witnesses of what is happening and their evolution.I watered at each stage of the film creation process, until the editing.This film demanded that we don't say too much.

I do not know if it is modesty, but it is a common point with it, for example - with the desire to trust the actor.When I proposed the script for her for her to Vincent Lindon, he was barred dialogues saying "that I can play it", and I understood that an actor to evoke sadness or pain, he is notObliged to speak - it seems basic, but it was my first film.The quintessence of all this is in Haffmann.

As for confinement ... The shooting was stopped during the first confinement and therefore we left the decor mounted throughout the confinement - we had of course removed all the posters and the too terrible things.But for people in the neighborhood, it was “funny” to go shopping in 1941. Besides, throughout the confinement, I never had so many press requests: I made all the American newspapersBecause it visually became the symbol of Paris which remains in plan.The decor became better known than Daniel Auteuil.

Did you choose Gilles Lellouche because you had worked before with him?

Yes, he won quickly in my desires, with Daniel Auteuil in front of him.As a spectator, I like cinema meetings: Gilles and Daniel, are in their respective generation at the top of the pyramid. As I was kid and I was going to see a film with Belmondo and Delon, thereSuddenly had a cinoche thing.In this very hard story, it was good to bring cinema.

This is my fourth film with Gilles, I have known his immense talent for a very long time - with at close range, he had his first first role.Has he had the characters to show his qualities as an actor?He starts to have them with a pupil, with northern bin.Playing a bastard does not deceive.So I called him, we saw each other, and he reminded me the next morning to say to me: "Well yes, thank you, I want to play this guy."What he is doing in the film, he is chilling what in the whole final part - well, when you do a closed door, you have an interest in having very very good.And the three of them are great.

Like Sara Giraudeau?

She is brilliant, in addition to being extremely sympathetic.I knew his work less.I discovered someone even stronger than I imagined, with a real intelligence of his character.I didn't care about her: as soon as there was something that she had trouble playing, I knew it was badly written, that there was something that was wrong with the reality ofhis character.And so I rewritten in office.Besides, the two boys quickly told me what a good choice she was.

It is an period film, with its reconstruction, but it is paradoxically in its quality of ambient silence that it returns the most to its worried time because there is little music in the soundtrack ...

I was going to say, "you saw well"; But you have heard! [Smile] These are things that we have purified as you go and because I am lucky to work with a composer called Christophe Julien who is extremely talented and a great melodist. As soon as he sent me themes, it was extraordinary and I tended to put them everywhere. And then at one point he said to me: "Wait, maybe you have to trust the film" and I got it for, as you say, play on the silences and lose a little of this cinema dimension for be really with them. For example, the first time that Sara has come down to the cellar, I had put music. Once I removed it, all of a sudden, it was much more freezing and we were with the three, with the dismay of Gilles up there from that of Haffmann, who does not know how to react and her who goes to the slaughterhouse. The music was sublime, but by removing it it takes a dimension that puts the hair. Afterwards, they are so strong, they play so much with their eyes that they didn't need to talk to each other.

The character of Gilles Lellouche appropriates Haffmann's jewelry creations resembling the Germanic eagle, met success with the occupier.But when he created his own models, he wipes out a scathing failure.However, these evoke a David star more…

Yes, I hadn't thought of that, but indeed, when you say, there is no coincidence.But he’s an ultra -loaded star.I was inspired by the directors who make their first short film: we want to treat all the subjects of the world-it was my case-we put everything we want, because inconcontably we say that we do not 'will be fortunate that one film.In his thing, there is everything ... and it becomes a ugly mounted piece.Besides, I had asked the jewelry designer with whom we worked to do something ugly.And he replied "Ah but I see exactly what is ugly!"So we didn't have much trouble ...