“Barry Lyndon” in a new Christmas setting

PFor such a visual masterpiece, a book object that lived up to Kubrickian requirements was needed. François Betz, from Simeio, has been making beautiful Books for a long time, having notably told the story of the first magazine The Point, founded in 1936 by his great-uncle Pierre Betz. This Barrylyndon splendor is also a family story, thanks to the proximity, between Lot and Dordogne, of François Betz with the producer and brother-in-law of Stanley Kubrick, Jan Harlan, who agreed to entrust him with the film archives so that he orchestrates them with the testimonies of collaborators of Barry Lyndon, like Marisa Berenson.

An XVIII^e atrocious and wonderful century of cruelty

This round that Kubrick conceived as a documentary on an 18th century^e atrocious and marvelous century of cruelty does not only apply to the famous candle-lit scenes, which the director shot for the sake of authenticity and thanks to Zeiss lenses used by NASA. It also casts a sublime veil of beauty and sophistication over a merciless world where the impulses for social ascension are shattered against class violence.

To Discover

Kangaroo of the day

Answer

The omnipresent voice-over and the distancing introduced by Kubrick with regard to his characters had, in 1975, cooled the spectators who remained on the ultramodern hurricane ofA Clockwork Orange. Gallery of paintings at the Constable or at the Hogarth? Mechanical trajectory of a vile ambition? Both, undoubtedly, with this impression of a time and a space controlled as rarely – too much perhaps – in the cinema. And, over the pages, we surprise ourselves to hear again the Saraband simplified version of Handel or the overwhelming syncopated staccato ofOpus 100 the Schubert.

“Barry Lyndon – Stanley Kubrick”, under the direction of François Betz (Simeio, 172 p., €59). Meeting with Jan Harlan on November 8 at 6:30 p.m. at the readers' forum. Screening of the film on November 10 at 2 p.m. at the Rex, in Brive.