Catherine Deneuve, who receives an honorary Golden Lion in Venice on Wednesday evening in tribute to her long career, prefers at 78 to concentrate on her multiple shoots.
Asked by AFP during a press conference about the meaning of this award, she replied:
“We are not looking back.
It's not a refusal, it's that we don't have time, and it's not part of my life, it's mostly that!
"I shot in Paris a few weeks ago and I'm starting an English-language film shot in Belgium in less than a month, so that's the reality of the present,"
she continued.
The film shot in Paris, which is due out this year, is based on the couple formed by French President Jacques Chirac and his wife Bernadette,
"in a light and spiritual style",
she said.
The actress came to the Venice Festival for the first time in 1967 with
Belle de jour
by Luis Bunuel, who left that year with the Golden Lion.
"Yesterday",
she whispered in an ironic tone, while greeting
"a very important festival for me"
.
She is a regular in Venice.
Its last appearance dates back to 2019, when
La Vérité
by Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda opened.
She also chaired the jury of the 63rd Mostra, in 2006, and received the prize for best actress in 1998 for
Place Vendôme
by Nicole Garcia.
To explain her exceptional career, she invoked
"a lot of luck, good meetings, good decisions".
“There are a lot of uncertainties, and fortunately we don't know everything before!”,
joked the actress, who spoke in turn in French, English and Italian.
Among her most important films, she cited
"those shot with
Jacques Demy
(
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
...) and certainly
François Truffaut
, and
André Téchiné
".
The French star with stainless blondness wore a small Ukrainian flag on her midnight blue blouse.
When a Ukrainian journalist asked her about the ongoing conflict, she kicked in:
“I don't want to express myself because what I say could be distorted”
.
When an Australian journalist asked her what sex symbol status meant to her, Catherine Deneuve put her in her place:
“I was not a sex symbol.
If you look at the photos of me, you won't find any sexy poses.
But there is always a challenge of course to have a certain look”,
she however conceded.
