27/07/2005 - Cinélibre-Cinéart is thirty now. Last May, Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne's victory at the Cannes Film Festival allowed Cinéart to have a twelth Golden Palm to be proud of

Cinéart-Cinélibre is thirty now. Last May, Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne's L’Enfant [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Luc & Jean-Pierre Dardenne
film profile] victory at the Cannes Film Festival allowed Cinéart to have a twelth Golden Palm to be proud of (after, for instance, Yol, Elephant, Rosetta, A Taste of Cherry, and Underground). The distributor clearly considers its catalog a great achievement. Éliane du Bois, head of Cinélibre since its creation, agreed to tell us about her company, which has become a big 'major' for independent films, as the late Jacques Ledoux used to say.

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In 1968, after a wave of protest at the ULB, La Cambre, the INSAS, and the IAD, a group of film students decided to create an organisation called la Ligne générale in order to spread propaganda films shot by our French comrades, based mostly in Paris, at least until they united to other agit-props within the Unité de Distribution (Distribution Union)...

Cinergie: Cinélibre was created as an alternative to commercial cinema, a chance to show committed independent films?
Eliane du Bois : The first topics Cinélibre dealt with, when it was published in 16mm, were immigration, women's rights, nuclear power, Chile, and the Vietnam War. We picked a series of 16mm films which we included in a catalog. We bought some of them. Paul Billot, who was connected with the theatre, introduced us to a few major stage people, such as Henry Ingberg, and offered to find investors to place a small amount at the bank Copine as a guarantee for us. This sum allowed us to acquire the first 16mm films. We circulated Sartre par lui-même (Alexandre Astruc and Michel Contat), and Harlan County (Barbara Kopple). The film went very well in the 16mm format (10,000 tickets) and won the UCC (Cinema Critics' Union), which led to its theatrical release in 35mm, our first release at the Arenberg. Soon after that, since everybody was enthusiastic about our catalog, we launched Ken Loach's Black Jack and Robert Young's Alambrista.

The next stage was the Monty period. You had two screens there?
One day, we came accross some young guys at the Monty. They felt like running a few screens in this old local theatre. The bar there was very popular and the place was hype so films went well. Having created Cinédit, we felt like screening films from everywhere in the world, hence our special weeks dedicated to Cuba, China, India, etc. After that, the Goethe Institute helped us organising a retrospective on Wim Wenders, Werner Schroeter, and Hans-Jurgen Sylberberg, with Serge Daney as a guest. Cinédit was a kind of high-range cine-club with fancy guests. However, we started having problems with the fact that we did not benefit at all from the bar's profits, although they were obviously owed to us too. So we split.

That is when you decided to buy the Arenberg ?
Well, it was worth taking the risk. We bought Cinéart, the company run by André Weiss and René Mestdagh. We collected every penny we had. The original idea was to co-own Cinéart for 50/50 with Didier Geluck's company Progrès films. It seemed obvious we should do this together, considering we were complementary. Progrès Films circulated slightly more classical films or films coming from Esatern Europe, while we were more committed politically. After May 1968, filmmakers like Jean-Louis Comolli still cared about the content, but they also worried about the form. They were less inclined on being part of a small committed group; they felt like reaching a wider public. Our ideas were in line with those of the May 1968 filmmakers, and evolved accordingly.

Was it hard to quit editing?
Studying at the INSAS actually prepares for direction or production. However, there is hardly a point in making films when there is neither theatres nor distributors. So I decided to create that. I did not realise Cinélibre was going to become a real company, with all the ensuing responsibilities: motivating people and involving them in a common project without its losing coherence. We wondered if it was clever to distribute our films on traditional screens, for it implied that we became part of the system and that we had to think of publicity, spend more, and promote our films so as to be competitive or at least be able to coexist with other films. Indeed, a traditional release implies a lot of promotion, high investments, etc. Eventually, we decided to leave the cultural spheres. What I find sad now is that people are to put up with 'standard' products. The films they see are all the same; they have forgotten classics and black and white films, and they are utterly lost when shown something slightly different from the norm. Spectators want what they already know; they do not even know there is anything else out there. There are good theatres which remain empty. Not to mention television, easier to use and in constant progress, with 'pay per view' and 'Video-on-Demand'.

In terms of DVD too, the choice is overwhelming.
The problem is that the offer is much larger than what any human being can take. If there were no critics to single out this or that film, the public could not make up his mind. Besides, marketing has become a race. There are so many things coming out at the same time on the market that each author needs to find a way to put forward his film, play, or book. Each release should be made an event, but it is not possible in each and every case. The creation of Cinéart alongside Cinélibre is a good metaphor of what happens with the cinema. Commercial films benefit from the renewal arthouse films contribute to. The main difficulty is that a film must be profitable enough to lead to another project. The industry has to be profitable to exist, but it also needs a research lab, lest it should die. This is why we also distribute commercial films, although I know we are much criticised for it. We need to, otherwise we would disappear, especially since Belgium is not a big country, which makes it impossible to go beyond a certain number of admissions.

Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne have just won their second Golden Palm in Cannes, and you are the happy distributor —always have been?
I started working with them at the very beginning of their carrier. Our first common project was Nous étions tous des noms d’arbres, co-directed by Armand Gatti. We went on with Falsch. We did not take Je pense à vous, for we did not like the film —but even they have had doubts about it. Then, they showed us La Promesse and we never split again. Film after film, they built up a style. Their latest film, The Child, has all the qualities of all their previous films put together. It is open-minded and moving like La Promesse, meticulous like Rosetta and Le Fils. It is strong and touching. We were all the more pleased by this second Belgian Golden Palm that it was really unexpected! (abridgements authorised by Texte remanié avec l'aimable autorisation de Cinergie.be.
The full text of this interview as well as the video are available on www.cinergie.be)