A Wave of Her Own

French filmmaker Claire Denis speaks about the role of cinema in culture, her own brand of cinema and the role of a filmmaker

From the country that gave us directors like Goddard, Truffaut and the French New Wave Cinema comes yet another director who has carved a niche for herself in world cinema with 11 films in the past 25 years. Claire Denis, whose latest film Bastards (a hard-hitting noir film) was the official selection for the 2013 Cannes Film Festival, is in India for a 12-day workshop at the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII).

Claire Denis

Apart from being a filmmaker, Claire has contributed to the development of formal engagements of French cinema since the 80s and is also a well-known teacher of cinema. Known for her unique approach, Claire has always seen films as something more than a medium of storytelling. "Storytelling is an important element, but cinema cannot always be used to give a psychological explanation. Our brains are full of literature and also of a dream world that consists of images and songs. And for me, making films is getting rid of explanations," she says. "Instead of providing an explanation, the audience should be allowed to realise things through the experience. The story is a basic entity and the way people speak of the narrative comes from their TV viewing habits. That cannot be applied to cinema,"she adds.

Claire's films are known to have a conscious connection of its characters to its setting, so much so that the spaces in her films also have a character. "It is an obligation for a character to exist in a particular space. And the movement of the character in time, has to be with respect to his location,"she states. She further adds that unlike photography, cinema is not static and unlike theatre, it is not live. Cinema has a movement in time that can be altered such that a 100-minute film can be a story of two days or a 1,000 years.

A still from White Material

In her opinion, of all forms of art and literature, it is cinema that can truly transcend boundaries. Having seen Pather Panchali as a child, Claire says, "This is my first visit to India and most of what I knew about the place comes from the movies I saw. No matter whether it's realistic or in the heightened logics of Bollywood, films enter people's homes and show what life is made of in a country."

Between her first film Chocolat (1988) to her latest film Bastards (2013), Claire's style has evolved over time. Having spent her childhood in Africa, the French post-colonial world is a recurring theme in some of her films like White Material (2009). "My way of making films has changed over the years. I have changed too. My body has changed and so has the way I think about life. I am less spontaneous, I day-dream lesser and I know I have less time than before," she says. "But I never really had a style in mind. I've not adhered to any way of making films. Neither mainstream, nor art-house, nor the New Wave. I am a wave of my own," she concludes.

Denis' Filmography

Chocolat (1988)

No Fear, No Die (1990)

I Can't Sleep (1994)

Nenette And Boni (1996)

Good Work (1999)

Trouble Everyday (2001)

Friday Night (2002)

The Intruder (2004)

35 Shots Of Rum (2008)

White Material (2009)

Bastards (2013)

Published in DNA (Pune) on July 9, 2013