Por for me, making films has always meant escaping the assignments of what I should be and would be supposed to tell » insists in the preamble director Boris Lojkine. He then makes the choice, with each of his films, to project himself into lives other than his own. The idea of making a film about bicycle delivery men who crisscross the city with their bags, branded with the application for which they work, dates back a few years: “ They are so visible and yet completely clandestine – most are undocumented. » The Story of Souleymane also becomes an almost logical sequel to his very first film, Hopewhich told the story of a Cameroonian and a Nigerian woman who meet on their way to Europe.
Asylum seekers
After touring in distant countries – Morocco, Vietnam, Central African Republic – he returns to the capital: “ The image of these bicycle delivery men worked for me, and I asked myself: what if I filmed Paris as a foreign city whose codes we don’t know, where every police officer is a threat, where the inhabitants are hostile, full of arrogance , difficult to access? » From suburban HLMs to Haussmann-style buildings, from McDonald’s to office buildings, from emergency accommodation centers to the RER, he films his city but from a radically different angle. The writing is based on a solid documentary base: “ With Aline Dalbis, former documentary maker turned casting director, we went to meet the delivery people. » Boris Lojkine collects their testimonies on the behind the scenes of their work: the problems with their account holders, the scams of which they had been victims, the relations with customers: “ They told us about their difficulties finding accommodation, and their relationships with their fellow delivery people, colleagues who are not necessarily friends. »
Casting sauvage
In each of these stories, the question of papers holds a separate place, as the director notes, particularly with the Guineans: “ Almost all of them were or had been asylum seekers, and this request obsessed them, because having asylum can radically change their lives. » The director decides to call on actors without any acting experience: “ With Aline Dalbis, we did a long wild casting, walking the streets of Paris to meet the delivery people. » The director delves into the Guinean community and ends up meeting Abou Sangare, a 23-year-old who arrived in France seven years previously, when he was still a minor. His face, his words, the intensity of his presence on camera capture the director and his casting director: “ It was him. » With Sangare and the other performers, he continues the rehearsals: “ The weight for Sangare was enormous. He is in every scene, almost every shot. » The latter is not a deliveryman but a mechanic. He then familiarizes himself, over several weeks, with delivery, to better interpret daily gestures. Little by little, he gets into the role. To the point of bluffing the director, as well as the spectators: “ Sometimes astonishingly beautiful, his face changing, very expressive, going through a whole range of emotions, he was always accurate, and often overwhelming. » No doubt about that.
Other films to see this week
THE WILD ROBOT. By Chris Sanders. 1:42 a.m.
“A robot – from unit ROZZUM 7134 aka “Roz” – after being shipwrecked on a desert island must learn to adapt to a hostile environment. Little by little, he forms relationships with the animals on the island. ”
What if I tell you Lilo & Stitch, Dragons and The Croods? This is the filmography, as director, of Chris Sanders before this Wild Robot. He is also the screenwriter of major Disney hits like Mulan, Aladdin and The Lion King. Today at Dreamworks, he is a true leader in animation and proves it, once again, with this very successful feature film which is already breaking records across the Atlantic. A great film to watch with the family this week.
WHEN AUTUMN COMES. By François Ozon. 1:42 a.m.
” Michelle, a good grandmother in all respects, lives her peaceful retirement in a small village in Burgundy, not far from her best friend Marie-Claude. On All Saints’ Day, her daughter Valérie comes to visit her and drops off her son Lucas to the vacation week. But nothing goes as planned.
The new cinematic vintage from the prolific François Ozon is on screens. Released last week, When Autumn Comes lives up to its title and leaves doubt surrounding a rather toxic family story. Oscillating between thriller and portrait of a woman, the film can be enjoyed like a good pan of freshly picked boletus and porcini mushrooms. Consume, however, with caution!
THE APPRENTICE. D’Ali Abbasi. 2 h 00
“A true dive into the mysteries of the American empire, The Apprentice traces the rise to power of the young Donald Trump thanks to a Faustian pact with the conservative lawyer and political matchmaker Roy Cohn.”
Legend has it that Donald Trump would have done everything to have The Apprentice banned after its screening at the Cannes Film Festival. It must be said that the Danish director of Iranian origin Ali Abbasi (Border, Nights of Mashhad) does not go with the back of the spoon. We discover a Donald Trump hungry for power and ready to do anything, even to betray the one who allowed his rise to achieve his ends. Chilling at times and therefore of public utility. Note the performances of Sebastian Stan (The Winter Soldier), unrecognizable as Trump and Jeremy Strong, both monstrous and terribly touching as Roy Cohn.
