Discreet and demanding, modest and independent. These are the first words that come to mind to define Laurent Cantet, who died yesterday at the age of 63, and who leaves behind an atypical and fascinating body of work. A political filmmaker in the best sense of the term, that is to say without dogmatism or ideological ruts, he has, from the beginning, taken the pulse of French society in fictions anchored in reality.
In his first feature film in 2000, Human ressources, he was already interested in the world of work and described the relationships between a young man, a graduate of a major Parisian business school, and his father, a worker in a Normandy factory. Even if he sometimes filmed fiction on other themes and in other territories, Laurent Cantet generally remained faithful to this social “line”.
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“ My films undeniably look back to their time, he told us in 2017 when it was released on screens The workshopfiction about a novelist leading writing workshops in La Ciotat. I want to report on a certain state of the world and not leave this task to journalists alone. In other words, I want to get my hands dirty, even if it is in no way a question of giving lessons, or claiming to be exhaustive on this or that theme. “.
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Education was one of the favorite “motives” of this son of teachers, fascinated by the world of school and by transmission. His most famous film, Between the wallsadaptation of the eponymous story by François Bégaudeau and a merciless chronicle of daily life in a disadvantaged Parisian college, earned him the Palme d'Or at Cannes in 2008. First French prize since 1987 and Under Satan's sunby Maurice Pialat, Between the walls was selected at the last minute, and presented on the last day of the festival. To everyone's surprise, the film topped the charts before triumphing in theaters – 1.5 million spectators.
Very shy, discreet irony
This success did not change the filmmaker who, with the same humility and always staying away from the fashions and chapels of French cinema, continued to plow his unique furrow, shooting several important films at his own rather slow pace. Among them: an unfairly underestimated fiction set in the United States – Foxfire (2012), about a gang of young girls in the 1950s – and another terribly contemporary one on social networks, anti-Semitism and the social divide between territories sometimes separated only by a few metro stations: Arthur Rambo (2022).
“ I live in Bagnolet, very close to Parishe told us then. I know the social and cultural border that separates the two sides of the ring road. This divide was to occupy an important place in my film.What motivates me most as a filmmaker is exploring the complexity of the world we live in. “Arthur Rambo” evokes the mental disorder and deep confusion revealed by social networks. And the film does not exonerate those who delight in reading the horrors expressed there. Networks are in a way the mirrors of an era where we praise a thought that is not one, where one-upmanship and insults reign and where we claim to express definitive truths in a hundred characters. This simplification of thought is more than problematic.
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We remember our numerous interviews with Laurent Cantet since 2000, during which this shy, reserved and courteous man searched for the right word while never departing from his politeness and discreet irony. We remember having produced a one-week report on his most complex shoot, that of To the south (2005), inspired by three short stories by Haitian writer Dany Laferrière.
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Expatriated for the occasion to the Dominican Republic, Laurent then fought against calamitous weather, undisciplined extras and difficulties of all kinds without ever raising his voice or taking refuge in the pose of the great filmmaker afflicted by fate. Puffing on his eternal cigarette, he spoke with the same thoughtfulness to recognized actors (including Charlotte Rampling) and to non-professional actors, and was as attentive to the canteen attendant as to his cinematographer. We will sorely miss his talent and delicacy.
