"Our environment will always frame relationships in a sexual way. People like to judge and put labels" - voila! culture

Trailer for the movie "Kirba" (Heart Cinema)

When director Lucas Dunnett was six years old, his parents went through a painful divorce.

He stayed with his mother, and according to him she was in a perpetual gloomy mood, until one evening she returned home in ecstasy.

"I didn't understand what happened, until she explained to me that she had returned from the screening of 'Titanic,'" he says in an interview with Walla!

culture.

"The film completely changed her mood. She came back from it a different woman, at least for one evening. When I watched her talk about the experience, I realized what an impact cinema can have on the audience - and I told myself that this is what I want to do when I grow up."

Donat's love affair with the art of cinema began at the age of 12, when his mother bought him his first camera, and developed in his youth, when he enrolled in a film school in his native Belgium.

Initially, his ambition was to create spectacles of the type of "Titanic", but after watching "Jean Dillman", the challenging and rough film by his compatriot Chantal Akerman, which was chosen this year as the best film of all time, he decided to turn in a different direction - a more personal and intimate one.

Donut's first feature film, "Girl", was released four years ago and caused enthusiasm, but also a storm.

It dealt with a high school girl who dreams of becoming a ballerina but is trapped in a boy's body, and was initially met with wall-to-wall praise.

But then, the hit ran into the automatic self-righteousness of the American media, which rejoiced at the way it presented the trans community, and blocked its way to the Oscars.

Donut's second film, "Kirba", came out this year, and this time nothing stopped him.

The film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival last spring and immediately became the talk of the day on the Riviera.

He won the jury's grand prize, the second most important decoration at the festival.

In addition to this, he also received rave reviews and was honored with a host of other awards and nominations - including a nomination in the international category at the Oscar ceremony, which will take place in about a week and a half.

Oscar nominee.

From "Kirba" (Photo: Haifa Film Festival)

"Kirba" even received massive distribution around the world, and at the end of the week it will also be released in our country.

It is difficult to talk about the film without revealing essential plot twists, so we will say only three things.

First of all: almost everyone who watches it, comes out bitter in tears.

Second thing: it deals with a close friendship between two children, which is undermined by tragic circumstances.

Third thing: this tragedy raises questions about our society, and the way it treats those who deviate from the norms.

Mainly, she talks about how we judge boys who externalize qualities considered "feminine" - sensitivity, vulnerability and warmth, and how we frown in front of boys who dare to show closeness to other boys.

"The film talks about a universal phenomenon, but it's also a personal story for me," Dont says.

"In my youth, I was afraid to be in intimate or physical contact with other guys, just because of the fear of how the world would look at me. I kept people away from me - far too many people, and there were also people who kept me away from them."

"Exactly - I wanted to talk about these double standards. One of the main inspirations for the film was a book by the American psychologist Newa Wei. She talked to 150 boys throughout their childhood and adolescence. At first, they were open about their feelings and about their relationships with other boys, but as they They grew up, that's how they became more distant, and didn't want to talk about feelings or relationships. It was hard for me to read it."

"Yes, this ambivalence is significant to me. What is interesting to me is that their environment directly frames their relationship in a sexual way, and why? Because it is the custom of the world. What interested me is not the identity of the heroes, whatever it may be, but the external view of the world towards them. The film is about our need to put labels on others."

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Rising star.

Lucas Donat at the Cannes Film Festival (Photo: GettyImages, Gareth Catharmoll)

Without making spoilers, God forbid, we can say that something dramatic happens in the film.

In other films it would happen at the 12th minute or the 80th minute, but here it happens at a completely different stage.

How difficult was it too decide to place it?

"It was the most complicated thing in working on the film. We thought for a long time about the most suitable place for this turn, and in the end we arrived at the place we chose."

"There were other options as well, but I really wanted a name that would both say something and leave a little mystery. My desire was to talk about close friendships between boys - a subject that has not been explored that much in the cinema. At the Cannes Film Festival this year I saw several other films on the subject, so maybe you can say that finally there is a wave of films that touch on him."

Donette's mother works in the fashion industry, and he is also a very fashionable guy, as you can see in all his photos from red carpets and award ceremonies.

"Girl" was full of style and this is also true of "Kirba", one of the most aesthetic and beautiful films of the year, thanks to the way in which director and cinematographer Frank van den Aden plays with the lighting and colors.

A colorful guy.

Lucas Donat at the Ghent Festival (Photo: GettyImages, Sylvain Lefebvre)

"We worked a lot on these elements," admits the director.

"My inner world is colorful and I wanted to externalize it. For me, the film is divided into two parts. The first part talks about childhood, so we see children running among colorful flowers. Flowers symbolize childhood to me" "In the second part, the flowers are picked, and childhood is also picked.

Instead Flowers, there are machines. The colors change. We use them to show how time passes, and this is also a central theme in the film. It was important to me that the room of one of the protagonists be red. The room is a central scene in the film, and red represents many things. For me, cinema should To speak in images and not in words, which is why the use of lighting and colors was so essential here."

"Because of the hockey uniform. They are so massive, they literally close the figure behind them. The mask hides most of the face of the boy playing hockey. They also make him look bigger."

"These uniforms are also heavy, and thus they become, for example, the weight that the hero carries on him. The film deals, among other things, with responsibility, and in the very dramatic moment when a teenage boy realizes that he has responsibility for someone else. It is a feeling that is difficult to externalize, and the weight of the hockey uniform is, for me, an image that represents her".

Prepare the handkerchiefs.

From "Kirba" (Photo: Lev Cinema)

Morrissey once sang "Don't forget the songs that saved you."

May I ask, what are the songs and movies that saved you?

"As a teenager, I felt lonely. I felt that there was no one around me, that I didn't belong anywhere - neither boys nor girls, and I wanted to be liked. I behaved like an actor - I pretended for others. Music and cinema were there for me, to save me. That's why I saw movies and this The reason I make films. The power of cinema is that you can sit alone, without anyone looking at you and judging you, and look at other people who you identify with and connect with. Cinema gave me something and I want to give it something back: make films that people can relate to."

"The film is about a wound that I have carried with me since childhood - a wound that many in the audience carry as well. It is a wound that we have not yet faced, a wound that we have not yet cried over. Regret is a strong and powerful feeling. I am not Greek, but Belgian, but I believe in what the Greeks call 'Catharsis'. When we deal with a collective wound, it leads to catharsis. The film is about trauma and dealing with it, and I am one of the optimists who believe that wounds can be healed."

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