BERTRAND TAVERNIER is almost 4,000 miles away, speaking on the phone from his Paris home. But it's easy enough to conjure up his face, as seen in numerous photographs and the 1996 TV documentary "A Film About Bertrand Tavernier" (made by Nils, his actor son). He's an avuncular man, soft-voiced, white-haired and bespectacled -- a sort of Gallic combination of Peter Ustinov and Barry Levinson. And he sounds like he's in a good, receptive mood as he discusses his work, much of which can be seen in a Tavernier retrospective at the American Film Institute's Silver Theatre (8633 Colesville Rd., Silver Spring).
The Tavernier series will show 12 of the French director's films, starting Friday at 4:20 with "Captain Conan," his 1996 epic about World War I, and concluding April 15 at 7:30 with his latest film, 2004's "Holy Lola." Tavernier is scheduled to attend the screening and talk with the audience afterward.
"I love to change moods and periods," says French filmmaker Bertrand Tavernier on the set of his 1996 film "Captain Conan."
(Etienne George / Little Bear)
|
|
"Not all of the films are dated," he says. "They are still talking about things which are very much valid now." He cites the title character in "Captain Conan" (also showing Saturday at 3:40), in which the French soldier and his band of guerrillas find themselves unable to transition back into normal life after armistice is declared.
"A man like Conan, I see him every night on television: People who have been fighters -- you can say heroes. . . . They have been praised and decorated because they were violent and very good at being violent. But they have a problem to adapt themselves to peace in Palestine, Israel, Bosnia, Chechnya. Everywhere I see people who normally should drop their Kalishnikovs and their grenades and learn how to vote. And it's difficult."
Tavernier, who has been making films since the 1964 "Les Baisers," has made a lifelong mission of avoiding being labeled. He takes pride in variety when it comes to choosing films, he says. But even Tavernier has his patterns.
He alternates, he says, between period and modern subjects. And his films usually show a deep appreciation for his characters and an obvious affinity with his actors, judging by the strong ensemble performances he elicits. (He vowed, he once said, to make his film shoots fun for his actors after being an apprentice for the dour, cut-and-dried Jean-Pierre Melville). His stories are frequently about a corrupt belief system that seems to permeate the world. And he has worked on nine occasions with actor Philippe Noiret.
"I love to change moods and periods. And I hope all my films have a kind of humanistic approach."
Tavernier also likes to make movies about "heroes who try to do something that other people won't do, and I like that."
He also likes moral dilemmas, such as the one in 2002's "Safe Conduct" (showing Saturday at 8:30 and Thursday at 8:35), about the moral quandary of French filmmakers during the German occupation. Should they make films for a Nazi-run industry? In those days, French filmmakers "had to go on making films," Tavernier says. "They had to earn some money to live. People say, all these years later, 'Why did they go on making films?' They must not forget, if you did not work, you were sent to Germany. So some people tried to make the film as full of dignity as they could. . . . There were no films which were praising collaboration with the Nazis, or anti-Semitism. . . . A lot of films were made where people tried very hard not to write any line of dialogue which would seem to praise one of the worst regimes we ever had."
"Safe Conduct" has its applications to other times, he says, particularly the McCarthy era in the United States, when the Wisconsin senator formed blacklists for those filmmakers deemed to have communist links.
"Some people behaved very, very bravely," Tavernier says. "I respected many of them. It wasn't just the Hollywood 10 [who stood up to McCarthy's witch hunting], it was [filmmakers] Robert Wise and Fred Zinnemann. I knew many people on the blacklist, and I was thinking of them when I was making that film."
Tavernier's proud of them all, he admits about his films. But he points with special affection to "Conan"; 1986's " 'Round Midnight" (April 9 at 8; April 11 at 8:50; April 14 at 6:15), about the special relationship between a drug-addicted saxophonist (played by real musician Dexter Gordon) and a French jazz fan; the 1984 "Sunday in the Country" (Sunday at 5:10 and Wednesday at 8:40), about the reunion of an old man and his long-lost daughter; 1981's "Clean State," shown April 9 at 5:30 and April 10 at 12:30), a black comedy about a dumpy cop (Noiret) in French West Africa who takes revenge on all the people who walk all over him; and 1992's "L.627" (Sunday at 9:05; Tuesday at 6:20), another ensemble piece about a year in the life of a narcotics squad in Paris.
"Holy Lola," in which a French couple tries to adopt a baby in Cambodia with disastrous results, is "a film about desire," Tavernier says. "It's about a couple which has to face the fear, the frustration, hopes and disillusionment of an adoption. And then it's a story of the discovery of a foreign culture. It's about two different kinds of wounds: the personal wounds you have between a man and woman trying to have a child, and the wounds and the hopes of a country learning how to survive. For me, it's a very, very moving film. It was very exciting to do. And I fell in love with Cambodia."
He's glad people will get the chance to see his films, he says. "And I'm happy they will get to see those films on the real screen and not only on DVD or on video."
For more about the retrospective or to purchase tickets, call 301-495-6720 or visit www.afi.com/silver. Admission to films is $8.50.
HOLLYWOOD'S GERMANY
When the U.S. Office of War Information invited Billy Wilder (an Austrian emigree) to produce an anti-Nazi propaganda film for postwar German audiences, the result was the 1948 "A Foreign Affair." The comedy, in which a congresswoman (Jean Arthur) is sent to Berlin to investigate postwar conditions but finds romance instead (with fierce rivalry from Marlene Dietrich), was banned for three decades in Germany and widely denounced for its depiction of Germans and Americans as equally corrupt, as well as for its irreverence in the face of a devastated Berlin. You can enjoy it for yourself at the Goethe-Institut (812 Seventh St. NW), which screens the film Monday at 6:30.
Showing April 11 at 6:30: Jacques Tourneur's thriller "Berlin Express," another 1948 film. This one, starring Robert Ryan and Merle Oberon, is set on the Berlin Express, on which a peace-promoting German diplomat is the target of a possible assassination by Nazi loyalists. Admission for either film is $6. For more information, visit www.goethe.de/Washington or call 202-289-1200.
ARE YOU A FILM FANATIC?
Movie geeks (21 and older), rejoice! The Independent Film Channel is bringing "The Film Fanatic Challenge," a traveling movie trivia game based on the TV game show, to town. Competitors will square off with other movie buffs in elimination contests for the chance to compete in a final round April 30. The prizes include an IFC home theater system, and a trip for two to the 2006 Cannes Film Festival. To enter, you may show up at either of these two venues: Garrett's Restaurant (3003 M St. NW; 202-333-1033) on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, as well as April 11, 12 and 13, from 9 to midnight; or at My Brother's Place (237 Second St. NW; 202-347-1350) April 21, 22, 23, 28, 29 and 30 between 8 and 11.
For more information, visit www.ifctv.com or call 212-563-7656.
-- Desson Thomson
