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| Romance on the run: Audrey Tautou and Romain Duris in Chinese Puzzle |
He first went to study film in New York when he was 23. French director Cédric Klapisch, now 53, returned to the city for Chinese Puzzle, the third part of the comedy trilogy that started with Pot Luck (L’Auberge Espagnole) in Barcelona in 2002 and continued three years after in St Petersburg and London for Russian Dolls (Les Poupées Russes), all featuring the same characters falling in and out of love. Now Xavier, economics student turned writer and played by Romain Duris, heads for the Big Apple to be near his children who live with his ex Wendy, portrayed by Kelly Reilly. Former girlfriend Martine (Audrey Tautou) turns up – and there’s also Cecile de France from the original as Xavier’s lesbian friend Isabelle. How did Klapisch sustain the momentum of the characters and what does it feel like to grow old with them? And will he ever let them go?
Richard Mowe: At the time of Pot Luck (L’auberge espagnole) did you envisage that it would be the first part of a trilogy or did the three films develop organically over the years?
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| Cédric Klapisch: "I don’t know if it is a good idea to do another movie in ten years from now and the characters would be 50 years old." Photo: Richard Mowe |
Cédric Klapisch: When I shot L’Auberge Espagnole more than 13 years ago now I never thought there would be a trilogy. Even when L’Auberge came out, however, people were asking me ‘Will there be a follow-up?’ and the question really surprised me. I said ‘No’ for two years after L’Auberge Espagnole because I thought it was strange to continue the story, but I did like the idea of working with the same actors again, and then I got the idea for the next story two or three years down the line, so that is why I continued. Then I made Russian Dolls in the same way as I had done with L’Auberge Espagnole - in other words in a very organic and very spontaneous way. Then after Russian Dolls I did think it would be interesting to do a third one.
I knew though that it would be best to wait a long time so I waited for eight years. Two years ago when I started to work on this project I discovered that I needed to do it in a different way than the first ones. The first two were kind of improvised by me as a director and but this one was carefully written and much more considered. Because the character of Xavier is 40 years old in this film his life is much more controlled and he is hopefully more mature. I needed to be more mature myself and to write more and to think more. The film probably feels different because of that.
RM: And is this definitely the final part of the saga?
CK: I don’t know actually – I used to say okay, it is a trilogy so we are going to end here, but the actors don’t agree with me and they told me to say that may be there is going to be a fourth one. I don’t know if it is a good idea to do another movie in ten years from now and the characters would be 50 years old. I really need to consider it carefully and to let time pass …
RM: You said that the actors were keen to reprise their characters – would you say in a way they are co-authors of the story?
CK: No, they really prefer to think it is my writing and my vision and they lend their bodies to it. They create a character but they are not those characters themselves. They like those characters and they like to follow them and they curious about who they will become. So the impetus is more about curiosity. It is bit like a TV series in which you follow characters through their lives and they have this curiosity about what happens to them.
RM: Was the theme of globalisation even more pertinent in Chinese Puzzle?
CK: The three films talk about globalisation, and for this generation the big thing that happened in the last 20 years is that the world has become smaller and globalisation is what we are experiencing. The capital of the world today for me is New York and the city represents what the world has become in terms of being a big melting pot with so many cultures and languages. It is much more the case than in Shanghai or London, Barcelona or Paris or Berlin. So it was fascinating to be there and all the scenes about being an immigrant in New York doesn’t mean the same thing as being an immigrant elsewhere. You are integrated – if you are Latin American, or Chinese or French or from wherever. The story mixes travelling and cultures so New York was the perfect back-drop for this. I went to film school in New York when I was 23 and that was another reason for going back. I had only shot student films there so I thought it would be good to return to shoot a professional feature there.
RM: What was the most difficult part of this shoot compared to the other films, which were made primarily in Barcelona, St Petersburg and London?
CK: Probably Russia was the easiest place to shoot in because people in St Petersburg were really friendly and helpful. The most complicated place was New York for the last one because so many films are made in New York it becomes very difficult to show a new vision of that city. It is also an expensive city and the working methods are very different from the French way. It is union movie and the rules are very strict and it is hard to work within those rules. You need to prepare more and talk more whereas in Paris if you decide to a travelling shot on the other side of the road it is possible but not in New York.
RM: Did you expect Xavier finally to find happiness in this story?
CK: When I started writing it I thought that Xavier and Wendy would be together and then I thought, okay, I am going to show them as an old couple and being content with their two children. Then I realised after trying it for two weeks I had nothing to say about a couple who were happy with two children so I realised when you tell a story you need problems, conflicts and drama. In our lives we are always looking for happiness but as scriptwriters we are always looking for problems. The film is about how you compare writing about life, and life itself. How it is close and different. Novelists and film-makers want to talk about life, but it is the same and it is different. The film is about what kind of mirror you show and how you can portray life and how different it is because you need to dramatise things. The three films are about someone who is writing his own life, and it is both his life and the way he writes about his life.
RM: How did you manage to get inside the skin of these 40-year-old characters?
CK: I am 12 years older than Romain Duris and I always said to him it takes me 12 years to think back and write about the previous generation. In Russian Dolls his character was 30 and at that age you lie a lot because you want to pretend you know a lot and in this one being 40 is clearly about having children and being parents and you experience life in a different way and have to take on responsibilities. You also see your own parents in a different way. You become adult and you decide on the path of your own life. The idea was to play around with what happens at 40 when you are not young any more, but you are also not old yet. I think with time you lose things and you gain things. The media talk a lot about youth culture and may be there is too much emphasis on that.
RM: How did you respond to the cultural differences of being French in New York?
CK: I spent eight months in the city writing the script and more when we were shooting. One of the big changes is that I feel in France at that moment we all seem to be rather depressed whereas in New York everybody seems to be enthusiastic. American people deal with the financial crisis in a different way and that is quite striking. In Paris people complain and seem downbeat. On the other hand it is strange how there is a lack of public money for things like street cleaning. We complain a lot about our high taxes in France not realising the advantages we have as a result of them. Americans don’t have many of those advantages …
RM: You reunited the characters played by Romain Duris, Audrey Tautou, Cecile de France and Kelly Reilly and but not some of the others. What governed the choice?
CK: I guess it was easier because the ones I chose were the better-known characters, but also because in real life you don’t see everyone you knew when you were younger. I had to create something believable so I could not bring everyone from L’auberge to New York. I tried to bring in Kevin Bishop who played Kelly Reilly’s brother in the first two, but in the end I had too many characters.
RM: Do we start to lose our sense of spontaneity as we grown older?
CK: I was talking to someone who was around 20 the other day and he was experiencing all these things for the first time – and for me that would be the tenth time or more. So sure as you age you lose the innocence and the spontaneity of the first time. It does not mean it is less romantic; it is just romantic in a different way. Love is different at 15, 25, 35 or 55 – it is less spontaneous but not necessarily less intense.
RM: Did Xavier and Martine find their relationship had become more harmonious?
CK: It is a question of your situation. In Russian Dolls he was always trying to pick up girls but here he has other things to deal with like his two children. Sex comes in a weird way – with his old girlfriend but he gets into it. It was hard to speak about sex in this film without being insincere or crude. I liked the way that Xavier and Martine fall in love with the idea of sex so the desire returns. They can be in bed together without any problems but the desire is there, which wasn’t the case before. I think we have an animal part of us, which we shouldn’t repress. This is the third film that Romain and Audrey have made with me and they had just come off working together on Michel Gondry’s Mood Indigo. So it seemed that there was a strong complicity and chemistry between them. The bed scenes were easy for them, they told me, and it was partly because they had been together so often on screen.
RM: How have your relationship and working methods changed with your actors over the years as they have gained more experience?
CK: It was probably more difficult to work with them on L’Auberge Espagnole because we needed to talk more and I didn’t known them and they were just starting off. The first film was all about spontaneity. Audrey was surprised because she had just done Amélie and the director Jean-Pierre Jeunet was very precise and I was the exact opposite. She had to react to what was going on around her and it was refreshing for her. It was the same with Romain. But in Chinese Puzzle it was incredible how experienced they had all become.
They understood faster what was required, but they need more ‘food’ and they wanted me to give them more. The first film dealt with something lighter – and I think this film goes deeper. With Romain it is a different story because we have done seven films together and it has gone beyond complicity. It is strange how we talk to each other now, because we met more than 20 years ago. It is a story of friendship and also a story of how we work together.
Chinese Puzzle is on release from 20 June. Pot Luck (L’Auberge Espagnole) and Russian Dolls (Les Poupées Russes) are available on DVD from CinéFile (www.cinéfile.co.uk).
Richard Mowe interviewed Cédric Klapisch at the Unifrance Rendez-vous with French Cinema in Paris.
