Carnivorous grasshoppers, a werewolf in the Pyrenees ... French directors are no longer afraid of playing "bad" by seizing the tools of cinema with great spectacle, horror or fantasy.
Without giving up the requirement.
On Wednesday opens, online due to the pandemic, the Gérardmer Fantastic Film Festival, an unmissable event for fans of the genre.
Sign of a new penchant for hemoglobin, two highly anticipated French productions are in competition,
Teddy
and
La Nués
.
The latter, with his plans worthy of
Hitchcock's
Birds
, carnivorous grasshoppers instead of birds, and his apocalyptic scenes, plays with the nerves of the spectators.
The director Just Philippot tells the story of a farmer (Suliane Brahim) who embarks on the breeding of grasshoppers.
But the case will change when she realizes that she can incredibly stimulate the growth of insects by feeding them ... with her own blood.
Angry close-ups of the mandibles, bloody scenes, the 38-year-old filmmaker had fun with the codes of horror film.
But admits that
The Swarm
will not shake hardened fans of American horror cinema, for example.
"
Basically, I'm not at all a genre film specialist
", fun to AFP the one who wanted to "
take risks
" by making both a film "
very spectacular which gives pleasure to see
”while wearing a real speech.
Read also: Werewolf, Zoom and demonic yoga classes ... the Gérardmer festival competition unveiled
In fact,
La Nurée
, which claims the heritage of both
Petit Paysan
and
Alien
, is a captivating and subtle dive into the difficulties of a rural family.
The film, in touch with reality, becomes almost documentary when it tackles the agricultural crisis. "
The genre film is a great tool for telling stories
" when "
French cinema perhaps sometimes forgets that it is you have to make people want to go to the theater,
”notes the director.
Renewal
A speech that resonates at the Center for Motion Picture Cinematography (CNC).
In recent years, the institution has launched calls for projects to finance French-style “
genre
”
cinema
, from the fantastic to the musical.
A way of opening the windows of a French cinema sometimes perceived as too psychological or too elitist.
Without excluding respected names from the 7th art: the filmmaker Christophe Honoré, for example, chaired one of the juries, and a project by the Larrieu brothers was selected.
A revival of the genre film, already started in 2016 with Grave by Julia Ducourneau, will it be able to attract an audience "
who watches Netflix before watching the New Wave
", according to the expression of the brothers Ludovic and Zherman Boukherma?
These directors, believing that each type of cinema, popular as well as cutting edge, can “
feed
” the other, are betting on
Teddy
.
The film is a bewitching cocktail around the figure of the werewolf, and a story about the difference and the pangs of adolescence, carried by Anthony Bajon.
The Cloud
and
Teddy,
which should have been presented at Cannes last year, do not, however, make us forget that producing a French sci-fi or horror film continues to be an obstacle course.
"
Why can South Koreans make ultra pop and invigorating films, when in France, when you want to do this genre, you have to do it more seriously, more socially?
», Asked the director Romain Quirot, during a round table organized on the subject by Unifrance.
A gap that he stumbled upon when he was looking for help to prepare his science fiction film
The Last Voyage of Paul WR
, which should be released soon.
This reluctance of funders is "
linked to the lack of success of the genre in theaters
", analyzed his colleague Mathieu Turi.
And this one will only be able to come "
when there will be a lot of genre films
" on the bill: the snake bites its tail.
