Claire Denis: Taking Her Best Shots

It’s difficult to define the films of Claire Denis. She has been called everything from a poetic realist to the “greatest woman filmmaker working today”. Her metaphysical, abstract body of work has covered much of what it means to be human, but her cinema has always felt very, shall we say, French. Denis has explored many facets of French identity: Chocolat was drawn from her own youth in colonial Africa; Beau Travail was a nuanced and harrowing portrait of the Foreign Legion; Trouble Every Day (the closest she has ever come to making a genre movie) arrived during the period of “New French Extremism”; while Vendredi Soir and The Intruder have taken philosophical approaches to themes of sexuality and relationships. “I could make films in many places, but I only have my life and one language and my culture is French”, she told me. “The language is the key: it’s the soundtrack, even if you don’t have a lot of dialogue. I need that, it’s my nourishment”.

35 Shots of Rum is the director’s latest film, but while it retains her usual lyricism, and subtlety, it is also an accessible and thoroughly satisfying piece of human (and humane) drama. “This is my grandfather’s story, with my mother”, she says. “(Yasujiro) Ozu, the Japanese director, made one (film) called Late Spring that is about the same story. Late Spring is about a widower who wants his daughter to go away to get married but he is afraid she might stay through pity because he is alone and he doesn’t want her to waste her life for him”. Should you be familiar with Ozu’s films (and anyone even remotely interested in cinema must see Tokyo Story) you will know that marriage and family were often central to his work, but does Denis share his preoccupation with the generational divide, something shared by both Late Spring and 35 Shots? “It’s more than a generational thing. The question is about different sorts of love. What are the love links between a father and a daughter compared to what this young woman should feel if she fell in love with a young man. For instance, the neighbour is very much in love with her. What is the nature of his love? Is it a stronger, deeper love than the father’s?”.

The father and daughter at the centre of the film are Lionel and Jospehine, Lionel a Caribbean immigrant working on Paris’ transit system. Yet the film doesn’t dwell upon racial politics or cultural identity, save for one scene in which third world debt and the effects of globalisation are discussed. “I decided she (Josephine) was studying political science, and this university in the north of Paris (Paris 8 in Saint-Denis), in many ways a ghetto university for black people, and I thought if I was black and studying political science I would be interested in those questions. Why not mention it in the film, to make it clear that it was about that frustration of never being recognised enough for slavery or debt in general”. That such issues should be mentioned so unfussily is typical of Denis. “Even though film comes from a lot of introspection, I like that the film is not trying to explain any psychological aspect of the story. The film offers pieces of life, and that’s all”.

In person, Claire Denis is small and brittle, but her demeanour is severe and thoughtful. She doesn’t suffer fools gladly, and when I mention that her films are in an art film tradition, she hastens to object. “Art films? This phrase is narrow. It’s non-existent for me. It’s interesting because sometimes I think if I was able to be George Lucas I would want to be George Lucas, but I don’t think we have much of a choice: Kiarostami had no other choice but to be Kiarostami and I think Spielberg had no choice between being Kiarostami or being Spielberg. I don’t remember once, in my entire life, thinking I’m going to be an art filmmaker. I just wanted to be a filmmaker, and somehow in the realisation of the film it is labelled an art film. But it’s not a decision I made. When I buy my ticket and go and see a film, I don’t decide “oh today I am going to see an art film”, or “oh no maybe a mainstream film”, I see a film! For me this distinction is… rotten!”. To hear the director speak so passionately about her work and her philosophies is extraordinary, for it is this strength and fearsome intellect that pours from her films. Her new movie may be lighter and less experimental than her previous works, but it could only come from someone with the experience, vibrancy and wisdom of Claire Denis. In a cynical age for cinema, 35 Shots of Rum is well worth raising a glass to.