PRODUCTION France
Lindon joins Brizé for A Few Hours of Spring
by Fabien Lemercier
05/04/2011 - Shooting has started in Seine-et-Marne on Stéphane Brizé’s fifth feature: A Few Hours of Spring. After Hometown Blue (Cannes Directors’ Fortnight 1999), Not Here To Be Loved [trailer] (San Sebastian 2005), Among Adults [trailer] and Mademoiselle Chambon [trailer] (Best Adapted Screenplay César 2010), the director is once again exploring a drama on a human scale.
The cast includes Vincent Lindon (who starred in Mademoiselle Chambon and is currently on screens in The Moon Child [trailer]), Hélène Vincent (Wandering Streams [trailer]) and Emmanuelle Seigner (Essential Killing [trailer, film focus]).
Co-scripted by the director and his usual collaborator Florence Vignon, the film centres on Alain (Lindon) who is released after 18 months in prison for trying to get 50kg of cannabis through customs in his lorry. Alain isn’t a common criminal, just a weary man. Prison was his way of escaping his dead-end life and being forgotten by the world.
He has no choice but to go back to live with his mother, Yvette (Vincent), a modest woman who has always been incapable of showing him the slightest affection. Suffering from terminal cancer, she would like to end her life with dignity in Switzerland, where a charity association will be by her side.
A Few Hours of Spring is produced for an estimated €4.9m by Gilles Sacuto and Milena Poylo for TS Productions (who have backed the director’s work on three previous occasions). The budget includes co-production support from Arte France Cinéma, a pre-acquisition from Canal+ and backing from the Burgundy region.
The eight-week shoot will take place in Ile-de-France and Chalon-sur-Saône. French distribution will be handled by Diaphana and international sales by Rezo.
TS, which recently minority co-produced Canadian director Denis Villeneuve’s Scorched [trailer], also has Ilmar Raag’s An Estonian In Paris in production.
(Translated from French)
