Emmanuel Carrère: “Juliette Binoche directed as much as I did”

Emmanuel Carrère, writer director

In his third film as a director, the great French writer transformed Aubenas’s investigation – the fruit of six months undercover in the midst of the precarious workers of the cleaning companies of the port area of ​​Caen, mainly engaged in ferries on the Channel – in a fictional film. An equally effective portrait of that invisible France which normally escapes the radars of newspapers and TV, to which cinema is able to strongly restore the dignity of existing. “There were many directors and actresses who wanted to bring that book by Florence Aubenas to the big screen.”

However?
But she didn’t trust, not out of fear that her words might be betrayed, but rather out of fear that the people involved might, even inadvertently, be. But Juliette, also a co-producer, was so stubborn that she invited Florence to dinner every year and she insisted. She convinced her and she mentioned my name. Power of chance: if I had written an original screenplay, I would not have found a project that felt so mine.

Aubenas is a journalist, while in the film the character played by Binoche, Marianne, is a writer by profession. Why this change? Did this make you feel closer?
There are many different things than the book. Florence says of herself: I’m a journalist, I don’t do literature. But I am convinced that you, a great chronicler, are also a formidable writer. There are two schools of thought in the documentary story. In one the narrator is a neutral witness, as if he were not there. The other accepts that the interaction becomes part of the process. To observe the phenomenon is to change it. The film is about that. Florence was aware of the risk, and while expressing solidarity with the women she lived among, she did not seek intimacy. Marianne is more naive, she is not aware of this risk, she goes too far and enters into a relationship of friendship which, beyond the best of intentions, becomes dangerous and ambiguous. She wins their trust but behind her is a lie, her false identity.

A moral dilemma: did you also ask yourself as a director?
There is always a moral scruple when dealing with the life of real people. I have great respect for investigative journalism, I admire Aubenas’ work, as well as from a literary point of view as a force of denunciation, because it has made public opinion a little more aware of the working conditions of these people. We didn’t have the same problem in making the film, the intention was clear. We did a long casting job among the precarious workers of that area, no possibility of doubt.

In fact, Binoche aside, he wanted non-professional actresses, like Hèléne Lambert who plays Christèle, with whom Marianne becomes friends. And Evelyne Porée (Michéle) and Emily Madeleine (Justine).
It was the only condition I set for making the film. We were lucky enough to have had almost a year between the end of writing the script with Hélène Devynick and the start of filming. We were in Caen for almost five months for the castings and then another six months for workshops, improvisations, to get to know each other, to become like a kind of theater company. Slowly these people, very far from the very idea of ​​acting, entered the process, and when Juliette arrived, who everyone was looking forward to, a nice chemistry was created. She was able to earn their trust, she was simple, kind, the opposite of a diva. And she directed at least as much as I did.

What do you mean?
Cinema is not my job, I don’t know exactly what it means to direct actors. I did what the director has to do, but she did the directing with them, like in a choreography. Everyone felt more comfortable. It is not just technique, it is the idea of ​​working together, of sharing a path, of enabling people to do it. Juliette was unique.

Cinema, he says, is not his job. But he knows him well: he is in his third test behind the camera, he was a film critic and screenwriter. What is the difference between telling through literature or through cinema?
First of all I am a writer, happy to have this third opportunity with cinema. They are different languages. For me, writing is more natural. I don’t consider myself a brilliant director, I recognize a quality: I don’t like directing too much, I prefer to let people bring their talent, be creative. There was a great story here. And a nice short circuit: at the base there is a journalistic text, the screenplay is fiction but the shooting was almost like a documentary because people interpreted themselves.

So, still cinema on the horizon?
This film was not in my plans, I like how it happened, it came at the right time, but now I don’t have a new project for cinema, maybe it will arrive in a couple of years. When you write you depend only on yourself, if you wanted to stay in bed all day paradoxically you could do it. Cinema has obligations, everyone on the set depends on you.

We see a lot of cleaning scenes on the ferries, they look realistic, how did you shoot them?
I tell you a secret. We made them when the ferry was at sea, during the crossings. Typically when you cruise on a ship you do it in port and try to convince the viewer that you are sailing. We did the opposite, shot at sea, during the real crossings, making us believe we were in port. The difficulty was the very small spaces. Everyone knew what to do, it’s their job and Juliette was doing her too.

The film in France has already been seen by 400,000 people, what do you hope?
May it increase attention to these workers. They work without rules, without even working hours, the day is broken up between various tasks, they have to pay for gas, they don’t have time to go home. It is a very tiring job and without rights. The book caused some debate at the time, I hope the film does too.

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