Première photo de tournage!

15:41 Wednesday 30 June 2010




Un article de OuestFrance.fr nous livre la première photo de tournage de Skylab.

Extraits:


De très loin, mercredi, en arrivant à la plage de Port-Blanc, on pouvait croire à un afflux soudain de baigneurs. De plus près, perches pour le son, tentes de régie et caméras indiquaient qu'il s'agissait d'un tournage de film. Celui du quatrième long-métrage de l'actrice-réalisatrice Julie Delpy, « Skylab ».


Pourquoi ce titre ? Parce que le film se passe l'été 1979 durant lequel la station spatiale Skylab1 se désintégra lors de son retour sur terre, en entrant dans l'atmosphère. Julie Delpy avait alors 10 ans, passait ses vacances en famille en Bretagne et c'est bien là le sujet de son film : une chronique familiale racontée par la petite Albertine, 10 ans, qui assiste à l'anniversaire de sa grand-mère, qui réuni toute la famille.

L'occasion de dresser le portrait d'une génération et celui d'une famille au bord de l'océan. Si le film risque d'être sans concessions, parfois même acide, il n'en sera pas moins tendre et comique à l'image de ces scènes de plage tournées à Port-Blanc cette semaine.

Autour de l'actrice réalisatrice, on retrouve Eric Elmosnino (le Gainsbourg de Joan Sfar), Noémie Lvovsky, l'éternelle bonne copine souvent râleuse, mais aussi Aure Atika et Bernadette Lafont. Le tournage du film qui a débuté début juin durera sept semaines, pour une sortie prévue au printemps 2011.

À Port-Blanc, au fur et à mesure que la journée avance, les badauds s'approchent. Eux qui pensaient s'installer tranquillement sur la plage et se rafraîchir dans l'eau, avec ces 28 °C pas très Bretons, c'est loupé !

« Silence ! On tourne ! Moteur ! » Les figurants, recrutés à Rennes et dans la région, tous en maillot, s'activent et les acteurs entament leur scène. « Coupez ! » lance soudain la réalisatrice, actrice de ce plan. « On ne sortait pas de l'eau dans le plan précédent ? ». Silence parmi les techniciens. « Et pourquoi sommes-nous tous secs ? ». Mauvais point pour la scripte. Pas si simple de faire du cinéma !

Dernir jour pour tenter sa chance: si vous êtes dans l'Eure début juillet, foncez!!

Castingdujour annonce:

URGENT CASTING LONG-METRAGE CINEMA SKYLAB de JULIE DELPY, Recherchons :
-
Hommes, femmes et enfants tous âges, toutes physionomies, pour interpréter les
familles de passagers descendant d'un train en gare de Pont-Audemer ou
Glos/s/Risle (Département de l'EURE-27). Tournage le mercredi 7/7/2010
-
Homme corpulent et JF et JH de 25-35ans, pour être silhouette dans le train.
Tournage le mardi 6/7/2010
Si intéressés, envoyez CV et photos. Merci et à bientôt
Date de cloture: 30 juin
Remuneration: oui
Montant propose: 96 à 144 euros/jour
Adresse de la production : Estelle GERARD "Le Skylab"
Telephone privé: Email: estellecasting@gmail.com


Si certains veinards font partie du casting, qu'ils n'hésitent pas à nous faire part de leur aventure!

Last day for applying to be part of the cast of Julie Delpy's Skylab...If you're in France and in the Eure department, don't hesitate!


The journalist and writer Stephen O'Shea has recently re-published an interview he made of Julie Delpy in 1991, when she had just filmed Voyager, an adaptation of Max Frisch’s novel Homo Faber. Here is the intriguing synopsis by Rotten Tomatoes:


An engineer survives a plane crash in Mexico in 1957. When a friend commits suicide, he returns to New York and embarks on an ocean voyage to Europe. On the ship, he meets Sabeth, a ravishing young girl who captures his heart. With Sabeth, Faber experiences real emotions for the first time, until he discovers the truth about her past, and his own.


The movie got mixed reviews, good ones (See for ex. Roger Erbert from the Chicago Sun-Times) or less good ones (See Desson Howe from The Washington Post).


In his interview with Julie Delpy, Stephen O'Shea comes back on her image and the roles she played, which don't necessarily correspond to her real nature. Here are some extracts of a very interesting interview:

Appearances are more than deceptive in the case of Julie Delpy – they’re barefaced liars. Easily the most outspoken, opinionated and downright smart actress in Europe, Delpy has nonetheless made a career of playing sweet, sunny vestals sullied by the forces of lust. Ever since Jean-Luc Godard gave this daughter of French stage actors Albert Delpy and Marie Pillet a small part in Détective when she was fifteen, French critics have hailed her as “a Pre-Raphaelite” or the like. (...)


sos: People have said that you yourself are something of a symbol.

JD: Right, a symbol of the past. I’m a bit sick of all that. I’d really like to do a film that is set in the present. It’s strange, because I’m not at all the type of person who gets dreamy about the past. It’s all because of the way I look, not the way I think. I don’t take myself for an icon, that’s for sure. I like to have a good time.

sos: You once said that most the scripts you’re given are written by guys who are trying to get even with their girlfriends, and that all the female characters are nothing but slabs of meat to be tossed around.

JD: I think that might be changing. Thelma & Louise is really encouraging that way. I’d love to get a part in a film like that. Not some skinny uptight feminist, but a woman who accepts herself as a woman and who doesn’t let other people walk all over her. Of course, I may be too young to pull it off now, but I know I’ll do it some day.

sos: So it’s good-bye to being an icon?

JD: You can’t totally spit on where you’ve been. I know I’ve got a bit of a pure and soft image – I can’t deny that. But you can change things.(...)


sos: You’re not turning pro-America, are you?

JD: I hate the place and I love it. But, as time goes by, I like it more and more. Sure, I don’t live there and I don’t have to face the horrendous social problems, but at least people there are fighting for things, at least they’re active. Not like in France, where almost everybody’s asleep. I spent several months in America, and I found that Americans were less apathetic, less asleep, more open to the arts. They don’t rest on their laurels. In France, somebody makes one good movie and he thinks he’s set for life. It’s a terrible thing to say, but once there’s a certain ease, boredom sets in. That’s what France is like. It’s soft, sad, boring. Everything is fine, so nothing is fine. There’s a line I always remember from a Max Ophüls move [Le Plaisir], that happiness is not cheerful. In America, there are outsiders, outcasts, and that’s where creativity comes from. I feel good when I’m in America and I hear someone yelling in the street. But maybe this is all very stupid and European of me.

sos: Yet you continue to live in Paris.

JD: I was exaggerating. I know a lot of great people here, and not just in the movies. There are a lot of weird things going on, though you’d never guess it. Some people I know look perfectly normal, but they spend every weekend in the sewers of Paris, having parties and just staying underground.

sos: That appeals to you?

JD: To my imagination. Did you ever see Eraserhead? That’s the sort of imaginary world I’ve lived in ever since I was a kid and my father used to tell me terrifying things before I went to sleep.

sos: I see. You once said that Peter Lorre was your role model.

JD: Oh, he still is!


Interesting when we know she decided a few years after that interview to move to Los Angeles, and become part American!

Julie Delpy sur ses projets

14:56 Friday 25 June 2010

Un petit film de Julie Delpy sur ses projets pour l'année à venir...




Source: Allociné

Notez qu'après Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy confirme qu'elle aimerait aussi faire une suite à Before Sunset, le tout étant de trouver une histoire "qui fonctionne"...

Julie Delpy talks about her projects for the year to come: Skylab, then 2 days in New York (where she explains why we won't see Adam Goldberg...). At the end of the video, she confirms that Ethan Hawke, Richard Linklater and her would like to film a sequel to Before Sunset. There is just to find the right story...

Un beau portrait de Julie Delpy

15:32 Thursday 24 June 2010

A l'occasion de la sortie de Two days in Paris, écrit, réalisé et joué par Julie Delpy, le site excessif.com sort en juillet 2007 un long portrait élogieux de l'actrice aux multiples talents. Retour sur un parcours hors du commun.




Belle, intelligente, engagée, originale, tels sont les qualificatifs qui viennent de suite à l’esprit lorsqu’on évoque le cas Julie Delpy. Comment ? Il y aurait donc un CAS Julie Delpy ? Sans doute, dans le sens où cette actrice ne rentre absolument pas dans les critères habituels, pour ne pas dire les carcans, du cinéma français. Fille du couple d’acteurs formé par Albert Delpy et Marie Pillet (apparaissant tous les deux dans son dernier long-métrage, 2 days in Paris), Julie dénote par ses choix de carrière pour le moins atypiques. Alors que ses débuts la plaçaient dans le sillage de la reconnaissance formatée à la française, avec deux nominations consécutives aux César dans la catégorie Meilleur espoir féminin (Mauvais sang en 1987, La Passion Béatrice en 1988), l’actrice n’aura de cesse de s’éloigner de ce chemin tout tracé. Femme de convictions, elle choisit ses films sur des critères exclusivement artistiques, privilégiant toujours la prise de risques (...) Le parcours de Julie Delpy force le respect. (...)




Julie se lance dans une carrière de comédienne qui la mènera très vite sur les plateaux de grands noms du cinéma européen, tels que Jean-Luc Godard (Détective), Leos Carax pour Mauvais sang ou encore Bertrand Tavernier dans La Passion Béatrice. Connaissant d’emblée une forme de consécration avec les nominations aux César pour ces deux derniers films, la jeune femme se démarque déjà par cette beauté froide mêlée à une forme d’innocence apparente. Apparente seulement, car sous sa blancheur virginale se cache un tempérament de feu. Cette ambivalence explique sûrement en partie l’attirance qu’éprouvent pour l’actrice les réalisateurs tenants d’un cinéma indépendant ou tout du moins se voulant en marge de l’industrie classique. (...)





La Française tourne ainsi sous la direction de Agnieszka Holland (Europa Europa), Volker Schlöndorff le réalisateur du célèbre Tambour dans Homo Faber, ou encore Krzysztof Kieslowski (la trilogie Trois couleurs). Des rôles où l’actrice continue d’exploiter son aura quasi mystique, créant de fait un brouillard intriguant, voire inquiétant, autour de ses personnages. Comme si toutes ces apparitions dans des productions d’Europe Centrale n’avaient eu pour but que de la préparer à ce qui demeure peut-être le rôle de sa vie : Killing Zoé. (...)




Eric, Zed et Zoé forment l’un des trios les plus attachants, repoussants et violents du cinéma. Roger Avary y prouve pour la première fois qu’il n’est pas juste un excellent scénariste. Thriller malheureusement moins connu qu’un Reservoir Dogs(Tarantino, Avary, ça ne vous dit rien ?) ou qu’un Nikita, Killing Zoé s’impose pourtant comme une pièce incontournable du genre. (...)





Julie Delpy enchaîne alors les productions indépendantes, dans une quête toujours plus exigeante d’un cinéma qu’elle conçoit comme autre chose que les produits formatés hollywoodiens. Car faire carrière aux Etats-Unis ne signifie pas forcément vendre son âme au diable. Ce n’est pas le chemin le plus rapide vers la reconnaissance, mais l’actrice a la chance de décrocher très vite le rôle principal de la romance Before sunrise (1995) aux côtés de Ethan Hawke. Un film magnifique, début d’une histoire d’amour entrée dans la légende du cinéma, puisque dix ans plus Richard Linklater et ses deux acteurs remettront le couvercle, avec en plus Delpy à l’écriture du scénario. Si le rôle de Zoé a définitivement imprimé la silhouette de Julie dans les rétines, celui de Céline dans Before sunrise puis Before sunset l’a fait entrer dans les cœurs. Comment ne pas tomber amoureux de cette étudiante française passionnée, névrosée, incroyablement nature de Sunrise, et de cette femme à la fois désabusée et idéaliste qu’elle est devenue dans Sunset ? (...)



L’expérience Before sunset, en plus de retourner les cœurs, permet à Julie Delpy de mettre en exergue une autre facette de son talent : l’écriture. Sa nomination aux Oscar dans la catégorie du meilleur scénario est un début de reconnaissance, mais l’actrice veut toujours plus. La réalisation l’attire également beaucoup, et comme à chaque fois, plutôt que de cogiter, elle franchit le pas. Avec un court-métrage d’abord (Blah Blah Blah), puis réalise les longs Tell me et Looking for Jimmy, avant d’enfiler toutes les casquettes sur son dernier 2 days in Paris. Une comédie sentimentale, genre dans lequel l’actrice se sent très à l’aise, qui confirme le talent protéiforme de Delpy et donne peut-être une nouvelle direction à la carrière déjà si marginale de la jeune femme. Quoiqu’il en soit, elle fera toujours partie de ces figures atypiques dont le cinéma a grandement besoin pour demeurer un art et non pas seulement une industrie.

Merci pour ce magnifique portrait!

Holidays in Europe...

12:35 Monday 21 June 2010


Great news for those of you who can afford some holidays in Vienna: this summer is time for a little Before Sunrise reminder...(15 years, already! Can you believe it?)

Wien info informs us that this summer on Karlsplatz there will be an open air projection of Before Sunrise:



Also free is the "Cinema under the Stars" on Karlsplatz. This year's focal point "Vienna in Film" offers classics such as "The Third Man" with Orson Welles and "Before Sunrise" with Julie Delpy and Ethan Hawke. An exhibition runs in parallel at the Vienna Museum on Karlsplatz.

I discovered on the same site that there was a "Before Sunrise" Tour organized to visit the city while remembering the great movie locations...Details here.




La ville de Vienne organise une projection de Before Sunrise à ciel ouvert cet été. Un tour de la ville centré sur les lieux du film est également proposé. Vous savez où passer votre mois de juillet!



Julie Delpy a été récompensée le week-end dernier au Festival du film de Cabourg, qui s'est tenu en Normandie du 9 au 13 juin 2010.


Elle a en effet remporté le Swann d'Or de la meilleure réalisatrice 2010 pour La Comtesse.


Bravo à elle pour cette récompense bien méritée!




Julie Delpy's just won the Swann d'Or for best director 2010 at Cabourg Film Festival, for her work in The Countess.



We are delighted for her!

(Photo: Purepeople)

An article from The Independent of Friday, 11 June 2010 got me all excited this morning!

In the last part of the interview, Ethan Hawke, here to promote his latest movie Brooklyn's finest, confesses that:

"Meanwhile, he is continuing to work on projects with his close friend Richard Linklater, who has directed him in several films. He's almost certain that there will be a sequel to Before Sunrise and Before Sunset. "I know Rick and Julie [Delpy] and I will do something else together. We're always emailing each other with ideas."


Oh, that would be AWESOME!


En una noche oscura
con ansias en amores inflamada,
¡oh, dichosa
ventura!
salí sin ser notada,
estando ya mi casa sosegada

SAN JUAN, Noche oscura del alma



On the Ina internet site (French audiovisual institute), I found 2 videos of Julie Delpy, 20 years-old, speaking about her (then) last film, La Noche Oscura (1989), by Carlos Saura.

Find out on the site the first and second part of the interview (in French).

The movie is about the life of San Juan de la Cruz who, in 1577, is locked up by Carmelites because of his ideas. The sufferings he has to put up with only strenghten his faith in God. While he is in this despicable state, he writes and creates poems that he believes God writes through him, and that move his jailer - who, eventually, will help him get out of this "noche oscura" (= obscure night).

The film was nominated for the Golden Berlin Bear at the Berlin Festival (1989). You can find a laudatory critic (in Spanish) at El Pais.


"No es", dice Saura, "una película sobre el misticismo, al menos considerado éste en sentido religioso. Digo esto porque, a mi juicio, hay un misticismo laico, y éste sí puede estar en la película, pero no el otro. En La noche oscura pretendo acercarme al proceso interior de la creación poética de Juan de la Cruz, que es un poeta tan excelso que, cuatro siglos después, sigue siendo de hoy".



= It's not a movie about mysticism, at least considered in a religious way. I say that because I believe that there is a non-religious mysticism, and this one can be the one in my film. In "La noche oscura" I try to approach Juan de la Cruz's inner process of poetic creation - and he was a poet so excellent that 400 years later he is still present. (My translation)



Julie Delpy was, in this movie, representing "the Woman" in Juan de la Cruz's fantaisies.

I'm afraid though it is a rare film to find, and you may only buy it nowadays from Fnac Spain.


Sur le site internet de l'Ina, je tombe sur 2 vidéos où Julie Delpy, alors âgée de 20 ans, parle à Thierry Ardisson de son dernier film, La Noche Oscura (1989), de Carlos Saura (première et deuxième partie).

Le film traite de la vie de San Juan de la Cruz, qui, en 1577, est enfermé par les Carmélites à cause de ses idées. Loin de l'éloigner de sa foi, l'enfermement lui permet une "intimité" plus grande avec Dieu, qui lui "dicte" des poèmes magnifiques. Son geôlier, touché par ces poèmes, l'aidera finalement à sortir de cette "nuit obscure".


Le film a été nominé pour l'Ours d'Or à Berlin en 1989. Une critique du film est disponible sur El Pais, où Carlos Saura explique qu'il a voulu toucher par ce film à la "mystique de la création poétique". Le DVD est aujourd'hui très difficile à trouver.


Pour la sortie en France de La Comtesse fin avril 2010, Télérama revient sur le parcours de Julie Delpy, ses débuts au cinéma, ses difficultés - encore aujourd'hui - à trouver de quoi financer ses scénarios, et son désir d'action, toujours:

The portrait of Julie Delpy by French ciné magazine, Télérama - where they speak about Julie Delpy's career, her difficulties to find money for her films (today still, even after her successes!), and her desire for action, always:

Elle a débuté, tel un ange diaphane, dans le polar crépusculaire de Jean-Luc Godard Détective et la fresque historique de Bertrand Tavernier La Passion Béatrice. Pure, évanescente : les adjectifs que Julie Delpy inspire à ses débuts, au milieu des années 1980, l'ont toujours exaspérée. « Ma personnalité était en radical décalage avec mon physique de petite fille modèle, romantique. On me prenait pour une bourgeoise, alors que, jusqu'à 9 ans, j'ai grandi dans 25 mètres carrés sans salle de bains ! Et le romantisme m'a toujours ennuyée. »

Il n'est pourtant pas absent de son troisième film comme réalisatrice : La Comtesse, d'après l'histoire mythique d'Erzébeth Báthory, qui assassinait des vierges pour préserver sa jeunesse en se baignant dans leur sang. En interprétant ce personnage, Julie Delpy révèle une féminité vénéneuse et achève de redessiner son image, déjà bousculée par ses précédentes réalisations, Looking for Jimmy, en 2002, et surtout 2 Days in Paris, qui s'est taillé un joli succès, en 2007.

Ce dimanche printanier, elle répond aux interviews dans un hôtel parisien pendant que son mari, le compositeur allemand Mark Streitenfeld, promène leur fils autour de la place des Vosges. Elle s'est écrasé le doigt dans une porte (« je suis distraite, je me fais tout le temps mal »), mais mène tambour battant la promotion de son film, en même temps que la préparation du prochain, une comédie familiale avec Eric Elmosnino. « Le tournage va débuter alors que le budget n'est même pas bouclé. Je me demande combien de films je dois faire avant d'accéder à de meilleures conditions... »

Après avoir tourné à Paris Blanc, de Krzysztof Kieslowski, Julie Delpy s'installe en 1994 à Los Angeles, fuyant un certain « snobisme » du cinéma français. Elle ne devient pourtant pas une réalisatrice holly­woodienne : coscénariste de Before sunset, de Richard Linklater, elle gagne ses galons dans le cinéma indépendant, « très proche des films d'auteur européens ». Et même si 2 Days in Paris a été vendu à plus de cinquante pays, chaque film demeure un combat. « J'ai écrit La Comtesse il y a dix ans, personne n'en voulait. Un producteur imaginait un pur film d'horreur, un autre exigeait Jean-Claude Van Damme au casting ! Le budget est modeste : pour les scènes de bataille, j'ai deux chevaux et trois figurants dans le plan, j'espère que ça ne se voit pas trop. »

En vivant aux Etats-Unis, elle a épousé une culture du pragmatisme : « Pendant quinze ans, j'ai écrit des scénarios sans les réaliser, par manque de moyens. Maintenant je fonce, même si c'est éprouvant. » Elevée dans les loges des théâtres où jouaient ses parents, les comédiens Albert Delpy et Marie Pillet, Julie Delpy a passé son enfance à la Cinémathèque, devant les westerns, les Godard ou les Bergman que ses parents l'emmenaient voir. Adolescente, elle jouait de la clarinette (elle a composé la musique de son dernier film), écrivait déjà des scénarios et dévorait les BD de science-fiction. Férue de fantastique, elle ose dans La Comtesse des scènes presque gore : « Mes plans préférés, ce sont les cadavres de jeunes filles dans la forêt. »

Ses scénarios évoquent, souvent sous forme de comédie, les rapports de couple, la famille, la condition des femmes. « Profondément féministe, mais pas pasionaria », Julie Delpy est définitivement plus à l'aise dans l'action que dans l'introspection. A 40 ans, elle assure réfléchir peu, ne pas savoir si elle est heureuse ou malheureuse, secrète ou expansive : « En fait, je ne comprends rien à ce que je suis. » Mais à ce qu'elle fait, si.

L'actrice a par ailleurs accepté de commenter pour le journal quatre scènes de son film:

Julie Delpy's comments on four scenes of her film, The Countess:




Un dossier passionnant!

The Herald Scotland published yesterday an interview with Ethan Hawke, in which the actor reminisces about his career - and what Before Sunset represented for him:


It hardly helped that these events [his divorce from Uma Thurman] coincided with the release of Before Sunset, Richard Linklater’s sequel to 1995’s Before Sunrise, which had featured Hawke and Julie Delpy as two backpackers who spend a night to remember together in Vienna. This time, with Hawke and Delpy assisting Linklater on the script, we were reacquainted with the characters almost a decade on. Hawke’s Jesse was now a novelist, a father and entangled in an unhappy marriage. Sound familiar? Even Hawke can’t deny it. “In some strange way, those characters are alter egos of Julie and I,” he says. “My favourite kind of writing and my favourite kind of performing is when you can tell it cost somebody something. That’s why Before Sunset will always be very dear to my heart. It was never a job.”

While that particular chapter did end happily, with Hawke, Delpy and Linklater collectively nominated for an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay (they lost to Sideways)...

Avril 2010: Julie Delpy parle de La Comtesse chez Ruquier, dans son émission "On n'est pas couché".





Source: Top-news.

More about Skylab's plot

15:28 Friday 4 June 2010

With the beginning of Skylab's filming, we now learn more about Julie Delpy's new movie.

Avec le début du tournage de Skylab, arrivent aussi les premiers éléments de l'intrigue.

Digitalfie reports that:


Scripted by Delpy, the film is structured like a long flashback experienced by Albertine and triggered by a train journey with her husband and two children. During the trip, she remembers another journey she made when she was ten years old.
We are transported from 2018 to 1979. Albertine is with her parents and maternal grandmother on her way to the house of Aunt Suzette, her father’s elder sister, to spend the summer holidays there.
It’s her paternal grandmother’s birthday and the whole family is gathered together, including uncles, aunts and cousins. Endless meals, heated discussions about politics, racism, sexuality and education: the parents pass on their anxiety to the children who hear everything.
Skylab, the US satellite launched by NASA, thus becomes a huge fantasised monster, when it is just an obsession of Anna, Albertine’s mother, a woman who is as charming as she is neurotic, and is convinced it will crash into the west coast of France.

In French at Cineuropa.

Casting includes (en plus de Julie Delpy):

Eric Elmosnino (Gainsbourg, vie héroique, Je T’aime, Moi Non Plus), Sophie Quinton, Marc Ruchmann, Michèle Goddet, Aure Atika and Bernadette Lafont. The cast also includes Jean-Louis Coulloch (Lady Chatterley, Vincent Lacoste (Best Male Newcomer Cesar 2010 for The French Kissers), Noémie Lvovsky, Candice Sanchez, Albert Delpy, Valérie Bonneton and Denis Menochet (Inglourious Basterds).


Hundreds of critics and reviews have florished over the years concerning the two most famous Linklater's movies, Before Sunrise and Before Sunset.




One of my favourite is more a thoughtful reflection than a review. The author, David Denby for the The New Yorker , compares the two movies and the situation of the characters when they meet again in Paris nine years after Vienna.


After exchanging skittish hellos, they decide to kill some time together before Jesse has to head for the airport to go home. Like the earlier movie, “Before Sunset” turns into an orgy of talk—flirtatious, soulful, boastful, self-deprecating talk, some of it borderline pretentious but all of it utterly convincing as the kind of intelligent and foolish things said by people who connect with each other through their tastes and their passions. “Sunrise” was fresh and easy and ardent. This movie is enchanting, too, but it goes deeper; it’s more direct, with intimations of sharp disappointment and unhappiness. Linklater wrote “Sunset” with help from the two stars, and one of the insights developed in the script is that most of us only get hungrier as we get older—more eager for experience, for emotional danger. Jesse and Celine are still a romantic possibility.


He then mentions a link with Rohmer which I find myself very interesting:


People who long to hear good conversation in American movies often wonder, Where
are the equivalents to an Eric Rohmer movie like “Claire’s Knee”? Well, Linklater, the movie kingpin of Austin, Texas, who earlier made the cult classics “Slacker” and “Dazed and Confused” and, more recently, the commercial hit “School of Rock,” has now created two such films. This one is both more spontaneous than Rohmer’s work and more daring in its technique. “Before
Sunrise” was a night film; Jesse and Celine sampled the miscellaneous pleasures of the street, talking to strangers and performers and whoever else couldn’t get to sleep. The new movie is set in a sunshiny late-afternoon Paris. For long
stretches, the couple walk through the labyrinthine Latin Quarter, with its yellowish-gold walls and tiny shops, and then through the winding paths of an elaborate garden nearby. As they move, the camera calmly recedes before them.
Linklater’s technique is simple and straightforward yet completely successful as a way of inducing the awkward self-revelation that he wants from his actors. Some of the shots seem to last forever, and the lengthy takes allow us to see the moments of hesitation and retreat and lurching breakthrough: when Jesse and Celine reach boundary lines—should they say what they really feel?—they take a deep breath, pause, and abruptly plunge into candor. The drama of the movie emerges from its form: “Before Sunset” plays out in real time. (...)

About the two actors/ characters physical changes:


In the earlier movie, Ethan Hawke had the soft mustache and goatee and flowing hair of a Renaissance poet. After nine years, he’s lost some of his youthful beauty. The hair is clipped; the beard now seems sparse and raffish. Lean and pale, Hawke is only thirty-three, but he’s got the harrowed look of one of those
downtown artists who work and drink too much and sleep too little. As Jesse, he doesn’t give a large-scale performance, but he catches a few small things beautifully. Jesse is still boyish, in the American way, wrestling with how much ego to show. He’s proud of his book but self-mocking at the same time, and he speaks haltingly, and then in spasmodic bursts. We can believe him when he says he doesn’t find writing easy.

Julie Delpy has lost something, too—the look of a golden-haired fairy-tale princess which she had in “Sunrise.” Her features no longer have that plush, rounded softness, but, as she has gained in definition and intensity, she’s become even more attractive.


And, finally, about Julie Delpy's life and her character as Céline:

Delpy was born in Paris, into a show-business family, and she has made films with Godard and Kieslowski, yet she doesn’t project the intimidating self-sufficiency characteristic of so many French actresses. She has spent a lot of time in New York (she graduated from the N.Y.U. film school in 1996), and she
has a partially Americanized sensibility. There’s something tentative and exploratory about her, an eagerness to try out an idea or an attitude, which Linklater tenderly draws on. In both movies, Delpy brings to the deep-dish conversations about life and love a charge of apparent artlessness: she seems to be discovering her emotions as well as her ideas as she goes along, and when she’s abashed by how much she feels she laughs at herself before giving in to emotion once more. From the first moment in the bookstore, Celine is trying to fascinate Jesse all over again, to seduce him with her melancholy, her neurotic difficulties in love. She wants attention from men, she says, but when she gets it she feels like she’s suffocating. What could be a greater come-on to an aesthete like Jesse? The couple are aware that their story is still a fable. “Before Sunrise” and “Before Sunset” are a rare case of two movies that rightfully demand yet another sequel.

An article that always makes me want to watch those fantastic films again!

1er jour de tournage de Skylab

09:42 Wednesday 2 June 2010

Aure Atika, qui joue dans Skylab, le nouveau film de Julie Delpy, a annoncé hier soir sur Twitter le premier jour de tournage du film!

On trouvait 1er ou 7 juin selon les articles, maintenant on sait que la première date était la bonne!

Vous trouverez même la première photo de tournage ici. Merci à elle! On en veut d'autres!

First day of filming yesterday for Skylab. First photo here, from Aure Atika's twitter account.

Plus d'infos sur Aure Atika/ More infos about Aure Atika on her official website.

A small article on NonStopEntertainment's acquisitions at the Berlinale 2010 reveals some precisions about Two days in New York, the sequel to Two Days in Paris:

2 DAYS IN NEW YORK, acquired from Rezo films. Julie Delpy follows the worldwide success of 2 Days in Paris, a box office hit which grossed over $20 000 000 worldwide with 2 DAYS IN NEW YORK. Marion, played by Delpy herself, has broken up with Jack and lives in New York with their child and has a new boyfriend played by Chris Rock. When her french family decides to come visit, the different cultural values make up for an explosive mix. The film is in production and will premiere at the Cannes Film Festival 2011. NonStop Entertainment is distributing 2 DAYS IN NEW YORK in Scandinavia and Iceland.


A year of waiting then! Prepare yourselves for some Red Carpet...:)

Of music and Before Sunset...

09:08 Tuesday 1 June 2010


Just discovered that nice article in uk.ign, dating back from 2004 when Julie Delpy was promoting her album - which is, more or less, the time when Before Sunset was released. And we all know that this movie contains three tracks of that album: "An Ocean Apart", "A Waltz for a night", and "Je t'aime tant".

Spence D., the journalist of the article, questioned Julie Delpy about the links between her music and Before Sunset:


Speaking of decisions, whose idea was it to feature Julie's music in Before Sunset? "Actually when Richard and Ethan heard my music they were like 'Okay, we've got to figure out a way to put this in the film,'" laughs Delpy. "I wouldn't impose on them to do something like that."

While Delpy, Hawke, and Linklater convened as far back as 2002 to work on the script for the film, she had actually written and recorded most of the music that would eventually end up on her European album Julie Delpy, which was released overseas in 2003. But when listening to the songs "A Waltz For A Night" and "Ocean Apart" it sounds as if they were written with the film in mind. "No I didn't," admits
Delpy when posed with the question of whether or not she wrote the songs after working with Hawke and Linklater on the Before Sunset script. "We were already
working on the sequel when this song was written, but I didn't think it was meant to be for the film," she continues. "I adapted them a little bit, though. I cut one chunk of the 'Waltz'for this film. It was obvious that I was singing a song about a one night stand that I had something in common with. But I adapted it a little bit to make it sound like [it fit the characters in the film]. It's weird, when I wrote this one night stand song there was a little bit with Before Sunrise in mind, also a little bit of me just writing a song about a one night stand, you know? When I recorded this song, which was a waltz for Jesse, basically. I mean I say the name 'Jesse' in it. I don't know why I wrote it for Jesse, I mean there was another Jesse in my life at that time, but it's just coincidence." Art imitating life imitating art, perhaps? Delpy laughs and
agrees, "Yeah, I think it's a little bit like that. I have a lot of that in my life."

As for the choice of which of Delpy's songs made the final cut of the film? It was a bit of a group choice. "We chose together the song that's in the film, you know 'The Waltz For A Night.' That was obvious it was the right song [for that scene]," explains Delpy. "Then the opening song, it came later. Richard was like 'I really love that song ["An Ocean Apart"]. I would like to figure out a way to put it in.' And then he was like 'Why not use the French song ["Je T'aime Tant"] for the ending credit?' I mean there's very little music in the film apart from what the characters listen to, which is Nina Simone and my music."

About playing guitar, recording an album (and maybe more?):


Remarkably, Delpy didn't pick up the guitar until rather recently. "I started in November 2000." But her musical leanings actually began much earlier in life. (...)

One of the reasons that Delpy hasn't had as much time to write music as she'd like is because she loves to be involved in various artistic endeavors. "I like to explore so many different things. I'll definitely do another album if somebody wants to put it out. I mean I've had offers, so it's not like [it won't happen]. But I like to take my time, you know? Because I'm doing so many different things it won't happen in the next two months, but it will definitely [happen]. I mean I've already written many more songs and I probably have enough to do another album, but I want to look for certain sounds more and stuff, you know, before I do another one?"

So what did recording an album take away from Delpy? "Well it took away the feeling that I was just writing songs for myself and for no one else," she says. "And now when I'm writing a song I'm like 'I'm writing this for myself' but I'm also thinking 'Oh, maybe it will be on an album.' It's a different feeling. It's not the same
at all. It's sometimes a little bit more intimidating, actually." She pauses for a second before continuing, "But it gave me something else, which is that I've been on tour in Europe and played with a band and understands the concept of playing music with other people. Before this I didn't know that."

Given that she's found herself playing her music in front of live audiences, doe Delpy find the act of performing music to provide more of a connection with people than the acting she commits to film? "No, it's just another medium for me to express my self, you know? I mean I love acting, but with acting you're very dependent on other people's desire. But with writing you're free and with music you're free. Even if no one ever wants to hear my music again, I can still play guitar and write songs, you know? I can play music for the rest of my life."
And finally, about cat and music:


"Okay, I actually do have a song about my cat, but it's such a hidden song. I mean it's not about my cat, it's for my cat. It's really weird. But I sing it onstage sometimes in Europe. And surprisingly it's the song that has the most success 'cause I go crazy at the end and I think I'm a cat!"


Great article!