A
Summer Day: growing up in rural France.
Interview
by Caroline Planque
posted June 2006
Not all teenagers spend their lives on
their cell phone or surfing the net. In Franck Guérin’s
film, they kill their boredom by roaming the nearby woods
and fields until the accidental death of one of them forces
everyone in the community to reexamine their role and
relationships to one another. Although Arte has produced
the film for French TV, it holds well on the big screen
and is touring the globe from one festival to another.
Guérin, a long-time documentary director, signs
his debut film with Un Jour d’Été
(in which Bernard Blancan, who makes a five-minute appearance,
was just awarded the award for best actor at Cannes for
his role in Indigènes).
- The teenagers in your film
are not professional actors; was
it harder or easier for you to
direct them?
F.G.: In a way, it was easier
because they were more malleable;
they had a certain naiveté to
themselves. But I worked with them
the same way as with professional
actors. Once someone is in front
of the camera, that person becomes
an actor. But the task of
directing an actor starts way
earlier than that. First the
director has to meet his
characters on paper and then in
real life. Then the actors have to
meet the character they are about
to play.
- What prompted you to write
that story?
F.G.: I wanted to tell a story
that would take place in a small
village, much like the one I grew
up in. I also wanted to tell the
story of 17-18 year-old teenagers,
especially in a small town.
Teenagers of that age in a big
city are a lot more adult. Not all
teenagers are like the ones in
“Elephant”. They are not all
surfing the net; this is not a
universal truth. Even if in big
cities, most parents will buy a
cell phone to their 18-year old
teenagers, it is a lot less common
in the countryside. There,
teenagers will go knock on each
other’s door. I still have a
feeling that this French
countryside stands back from
modernity. I would not call it
backwards though.
I also scanned through the
accidents that occurred in France
with failing equipment on
basketball courts or soccer
fields, accidents that implied
someone else’s responsibility. I
enjoyed the idea of putting the
blame on the mayor to show how,
suddenly, the community
transferred its responsibility on
a sole individual. But I was most
interested in the consequences of
the accident in the mayor’s
private and intimate life.
- By portraying different
social classes, are you trying to
initiate some sort of social
criticism?
F.G.: No. Obviously I wanted to
portray different social classes,
but they were all presented in the
same light. There is no discourse
from my part about the nature of
their differences. I am not trying
to initiate a discourse of any
sort. The film is not completely
explicit either. I enjoy letting
the spectator ponder and interpret
my movie. I enjoy that as a
spectator myself, so I want to
leave this open for people who
will watch my movie. I enjoy
ambiguity, unspoken words, and
confusion. I want to leave things
open.
- One can feel that especially
through the character of Sébastien.
F.G.: His character is inhabited
by hesitation. What is interesting
is to notice that, because of his
best friend’s death, this
hesitation, which was his since
the beginning, finally reveals
itself and suddenly allows him to
live. This is one of the movie’s
ambiguities: in a way, Sébastien
finds himself liberated because of
Mickaël’s death.
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