04/07/2007

After Human Resources, Time Out and Heading South [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Laurent Cantet
interview: Robin Campillo
interview: Simon Arnal-Szlovak
film profile] (see Focus), Laurent Cantet has begun filming on his fourth feature, Entre les murs.

The director has been busy at work in Paris’ 19th arrondissement since Monday on the adaptation of the eponymous novel by François Bégaudeau, the story of a French teacher at a secondary school in a difficult area. Bégaudeau – who penned the script with Cantet and Robin Campillo – also stars as himself in the film, which features 25 young teenagers.

Interviewed at the beginning of June by the Ivry city newspaper at an event organised by ACRIF (Association des Cinémas de Recherche d’Ile-de-France), Caroline Benjo, who produced the film with Carole Scotta, said that "Entre les murs shows that it is possible to talk to pupils from these schools in a different way than they are often spoken to. The book, which goes against all prejudice, is very much in line with Laurent Cantet’s films and the social issues he deals with".

In fact, last September the director set up an educational workshop at the Françoise Dolto secondary school (20th arrondissement of Paris) to develop the script and recruit cast members, a method he also used for Human Resources.

Meanwhile, Bégaudeau offered some more specific details on the adaptation: "For the script, we were obliged to dramatise. Some scenes from the novel can also be found in the film, but the idea was to work with amateurs and to get them to try out different situations. Based on what they suggested, we were able to put together the film. The film aims to achieve the same thing as the book: to stay in one class, and by looking at what happens, we understand many things off scene, about French society, about the life of these kids. I think that Games of Love and Chance has much more dialogue than what we are going to do. If we succeed in finding the same naturalness among the teenagers, we’ll have achieved what we wanted. But Games of… had the tendency to always be hysterically verbal, whereas the experience I have with these teenagers is that there is a lot of communication and energy but also silent pauses at times."

Produced by Haut et Court, Entre les murs will shoot for seven weeks. Co-produced by France 2 Cinéma, the film received CNC advances on receipts of €400,000 and backing from the Ile-de-France region (€384,000). It was also backed by the new CNC Images de la diversité fund, as well as Soficas Cofinova and Soficinéma. Entre les murs has been pre-sold to Canal + and Ciné Cinéma.

Haut et Court will handle the film’s French release, while world sales are still under negotiation.

(Translated from French)