As the title of Preston Sturges` 1956 film puts it: The French, they are a funny race.
First they elevate Jerry Lewis into cinematic canonization, and now they have turned a film about a pair of seemingly obscure late-17th Century viol players/composers into an incredible smash hit since its opening a year ago. It has won seven Cesars-the French equivalent of the Oscars-including best film and best director. What`s more, the album-with music arranged and performed by violist Jordi Savall-has been No. 2 on Paris` Top 10 list, second only to Michael Jackson.
Not that it is strictly a Gallic phenomenon. In its first week in Argentina, it was the No. 1 film, and when it had its inaugural in New York last month (it opens here Friday at the Music Box), it turned out to be the biggest Manhattan opening for a foreign-language film this year.
Directed by Alain Corneau and adapted by Corneau and Pascal Quignard from the latter`s novel, ”Tous les Matins du Monde” (roughly, ”All the Mornings of the World”) stars Jean-Pierre Marielle as Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe, a brilliant musician about whom little is known (not even his first name nor his birth and death dates), and Gerard Depardieu as his student, Marin Marais, who eventually surpassed his teacher in his performance on the viol, or viol da gamba (leg viol), and became court composer to Louis XIV.
”It`s been very strange,” the ebullient Corneau-best known to American audiences for his police thrillers (”Choice of Arms,” ”Police Python 357”) said during a recent visit to Chicago. ”I never expected such a success. It was really a surprise. First of all, people got very emotional in the theater, especially women. They were crying and all that, and people were staying until the end of the credits because of the music. So the people were moved by the film.
”Secondly, without knowing it, we were manipulating very deep and simple themes like master and pupil, father and son. Also, what happened in France is that Sainte-Colombe became a kind of symbol of purity, a kind of ideological morality, is that how you say it? Even the political editorialists were saying that a lot of people in the government should go see this film. Another reason for its success may be that the 17th Century is important to France, but it`s always hidden behind a facade of Versailles and all that, and people forget about the very dark side of the century. Which is why the music is called Baroque, which means contradiction.”
The 49-year-old Corneau said the project was an old personal dream of his, that his life is divided between cinema and music and he wanted to bring the two together.
”I wasn`t sure what kind of music I wanted to do at first. I thought of jazz, but then I thought it really wasn`t my expertise. Then it became clear to me that it should be this French Baroque music, which was coming back very strong all over Europe and now is really kind of a mass movement. This music was really unknown and forgotten by the French people, and now they`re playing it not because they want to make museum music, but because they feel it is very modern.”
Three years ago he approached Quignard, a popular novelist, who, Corneau said, was also ”obsessed” by Baroque music and could write in a 17th Century style. ”He got very excited, but said, `I don`t know anything about cinema, so I won`t write a screenplay. I will write what I know, which is a novel,`
and from that we made the film.”
Not a conventional biography, the film is a rather mythical account of Sainte-Colombe`s relationship with his beautiful, young, late wife (who is still very much alive in his mind), his two daughters (one of whose life takes a tragic turn) and, especially, Marin Marais, who tells the story in flashback. (The youthful Marais is played by Guillaume Depardieu, Gerard`s 21- year-old son.)
”Sainte-Colombe is kind of a hermit, intoxicated by his own music,”
Corneau said. ”Musicians at that time believed that music was the real language and that talking was only lying. So he can`t express anything of his feelings; that`s the main point, psychologically speaking. He doesn`t want to compromise, and he`s attracted by solitude. He built a cabin to hide himself because he didn`t want other musicians to hear his secrets.
”He and Marin Marais are very different. Light and shadow, day and night and so on. Marais is a modern musician. He makes money with it. Now, he is not very sympathetic, either. He walks on everybody. But his music is very nice also. He loves to play at the court of Louis XIV. His father was a shoemaker, and he wants to become very famous. Even young, he is an incredible musician. The only thing is that he`s a new generation musician. In Sainte-Colombe`s point of view, he is a revolutionary. If Marin Marais were alive today, I think he`d have his own television show.
”He was a very important Louis XIV musician for two reasons. One, he was the best viol player of his time; he`d play very delicate pieces at Versailles. And he was writing very popular operas like `Alcide.` They were really huge successes.”
The viol da gamba, Corneau added, was very big in Paris and London in the late 17th Century. ”I thought for a long time that it was the ancestor of the cello, which is not true. The cello came from the violin in Italy, and the viol da gamba came from the guitar and lute from Spain, perhaps. Marin Marais was at the summit of it, and when he died (in 1728) it was the end of the viol da gamba because tastes had changed. The cello was louder and more part of the symphony orchestra, which was becoming important.
”The viol da gamba also went out because of a political reason. It was a symbol of the nobility, so during the French Revolution, a lot of instruments were destroyed by the people. That`s why it disappeared entirely. You have to wait until the 1950s and `60s when Wieland Kuijken and Jordi Savall started to go back to that instrument. And now it`s a symbol of the rebirth of Baroque music. Now that the film has become such an incredible success, I keep getting letters from teachers in the conservatories saying, `I don`t know what to do. I don`t have anyone who can teach it.` ”
For his leading performer, he made the unusual choice of Marielle, who has made more than 60 feature and TV films but is best known in France as a stand-up comedian. ”It was unusual, but it`s an old story. When you cast a good comedian in a very black, very dark, role, he will be splendid because good comedians are very sad.
”For me, Gerard Depardieu is very special because we came into the cinema at the same moment, and I`ve since made three films with him. He`s a very good actor, but he`s not a star. He will always be surprising, and the audience will never know where he`s coming from, except that you feel he`s bourgeois and that he`s coming from the earth.”
The film was shot in a chateau-no electricity, no plumbing-in Creuse in the center of France. ”It was a miracle to find it. It was entirely in a 17th Century state. No swimming pool, nothing. It was exactly what I was dreaming about, because this castle was like Sainte-Colombe himself. We spent seven weeks there; it was like being in a monastery. It was like going back into ages ago. This section of the country is almost entirely deserted. There were no hotels or anything. We had to find small apartments and houses.” Corneau paused and laughed. ”Of course, there were good restaurants, even in the middle of nowhere. I mean, we were in France.”
