with its magnificent ‘Five demons’ (Official Fantàstic Competition), screenwriter and director Lea Mysius He belongs to the wave of young French filmmakers who pursue their auteur ambitions without ignoring the codes of the fantastic. “In France we tried to open up the barriers and leave naturalism a little behind,” he explains. “We want to express the world in a different way. bring back the magic“.
Her story, full of secrets and scents, may remind us of ‘Crudo’, written by Julia Ducournau, who won a triple award at Sitges 2016, with her dedication to what we might call condensed realism. Mysius approves of this definition of style, adding, “I was interested in giving a girl’s perspective. Showing the magic that surrounds children who often confuse reality with dreams. For me, cinema should explain the wizarding world. There is a real world you need to know, but it is no less true that dreams and fantasies exist.“.
David Lynch as Compass
The girl Mysius is talking about is the biracial Vicky (small but giant Sally Drama), his mother lifeguard Joanne (Adèle Exarchopoulos), to whom he feels allegiance. To his father, firefighter Jimmy (mustafa mbengue), having trouble finding that passion for Joanne in him. After Aunt Julia entered the scene (Swala Emati), Sally embarks on an unexpected journey through family history and the roots of an event that left its mark on their mountain town.
It would be a crime to go into more detail about the plot. Among the film’s achievements, Mysius says, is its slow and clever dosing of information “in an attempt to perpetuate the mystery above all else.” “I was very careful about how David Lynch did it. I went through his scripts and realized he actually gave us a lot of information, but he does it with eyedroppers and mostly through editing. My editor Marie Loustalot and I treated the story like a big Jenga that we had to get the pieces out of before the tower collapsed”.
Scents that bring images
The Senses are a personal obsession for our interviewee: her first feature film in 2017, ‘Ava’, revolved around a thirteen-year-old girl who has to prepare for blindness. “I want to make a very physical, very physical cinema. The emotion I dealt with in ‘Ava’ was more cinematic, it was the sense of sight. Fragrance is less visible, but can also send images to us“Mysius smiles and shows curiosity when I suggest moving to Odorama. John Waters For the premiere of ‘Polyester’ in 1981.
The aforementioned ‘Ava’ was not screened in our cinemas, but we had the opportunity to see ‘The Ghosts of Ismael’ and ‘Paris, 13th District’, written by Mysius, together with respected people. Arnaud Desplechin Y Jacques Audiard, respectively. “Desplechin was looking for a screenwriter through La Fémis. [la escuela nacional de cine de Francia]. After doing some tests, I was selected. I then got a job thanks to word of mouth and the good reception of ‘Ava’. I am very interested in working with other directors; After all, I didn’t quit writing, and entering the universe of other filmmakers enriches me. I have two lives: one where I work for myself and the other where I work for others while being myself.“.