The 40th Santa Barbara Film Festival held its international author panel on Sunday, February 9. Directors gints zilbalodis (“Flow”), Walter Salles (“I’m still here”), Mohammad Rasoulof (“The seed from the holy figs”) and Jacques Audiard (“Emilia Pérez”) joined the festival director Roger Durling for a broad question and answer to the Arlington Theater.
Audiard, who came from a controversial in recent weeks for his film’s award campaign, had a more easy-to-hearted opportunity to reflect on its best image-nominees. Durling emphasized the director’s history by producing music on the screen throughout his career. Audiard responded by noting how his “natural masochism” affects him to make films in language that he does not speak or understand.
“It’s incredible because the only memory I actually have about really articulating music and opera in my work was for my second function,” a self -made hero, “Audiard said.” At that time I had thought of making a small opera based on that movie with the composer. Then it was a development, and you know, I really have “With this additional thing that two characters would talk to each other without understanding each other.”
“And from that point, I started making movies in language that I don’t speak and don’t understand,” he continued. “You can attribute it to my natural masochism. But in fact, what began to attract me was the musicality of language on sets; I began to lose interest in the actual meaning and be drawn to the music and song in the dialogue. “
As the conversation continued, Audiard talked about some of his most pressing challenges with the film, including depth of film – something that the director stated that he only learned 20 years ago and worked with “a prophet.” “‘A Prophet’ really taught me a lot. It may seem stupid to have learned what the field depth really meant around the age of 50, but that is what “a prophet” did to me and what I understood. “
“In ‘Emilia Pérez’ I shot at a sound scene and I didn’t have much depth. We didn’t even have as much as this room here. What I quickly understood is that I would have to use the choreography and bodies to deal with that issue of field depth. The whole choreography served as a background and therefore allowed me not to have to fight the set, ”he said.
His answer came directly from the heel of Rasoulof and talked about the challenges he experienced when he made his film, including being imprisoned and handled disaster censorship. “My answers are very prosaic,” said Audiard.
“I would have loved talking about metaphor and self -censorship. I am really ashamed to talk about my first world problems when Mohammad here has just talked about his problems is how much light for a square foot, what he had to handle as a surface, you know, while you are here as, “our Depth was just, you know, not really this theater. ” We really are in different worlds and apologize to you, Mohammad. “
While making the “seed from the holy fig” Patsulof Pat himself on the back every day for filming. He never thought he would finish the project, so every day with successful shooting was a reason to celebrate.
“I had to tell a story with many limitations,” Rasoulof explained. “And when I reached (a) point in the story, I just hit my head, and I thought, ‘What should I do with the critics? They will be very angry at me. They will think that I do not know the cinema. They will think that I do not know genre and that I go in and out between the two genres. “”
He continued, “then I told myself,” you have paid the price for your social and political freedom. You have gone to jail, you have made so many devotions to it. But what about your artistic freedom? ‘It was the point I thought I had to do what I want to do. And that was another factor involved, and it was the fact that I never thought I would actually end the movie. Every day we went to shoot, I would pat myself on the shoulder and I would say to myself: “Just go and enjoy it, don’t think about ending.”
