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From the genius behind To Be and To Have and In the Land of the Deaf
In 1976, French director René Allio made Moi, Pierre Rivière, a film based on a 19th-century countryside murder. The story had recently resurfaced thanks to Michel Foucault, who, after discovering the peasant murderer Rivière’s beautifully expressed confession, wrote a book about the case. Allio wanted to film the story on location, using farmers from the region of Normandy, where the crime occurred. 24-year-old Nicolas Philibert, the assistant director, was tasked with scouting locations and finding a cast among the locals. Thirty years later, Philibert returns to the region to catch up with the earlier film’s players, to revisit a page from his own history, and to tell the stories of this strange murder and the film that recreated it.
Back to Normandy is a film about the passage of time. In seeking out the cast, Philibert explores how we make connections between past and present, creating our own meaningful and personal narratives. As Phillibert reveals the motivations for the crime of Pierre Rivière, we also learn of the mysterious disappearance of the melancholy young villager who played him, Claude Hébert. When we finally learn what became of him, the parallels between the actor and his role are startling.
A subtle and contemplative film, Back to Normandy also follows Philibert as he delves into the diaries of his mentor Allio, telling the director’s story and chronicling the difficult production history of his most ambitious film. The patterns of rural life — the passing of the seasons, the raising of livestock, the cultivation of the land — have an amazing continuity stretching back from the 1830s to the present day. Like Ermanno Olmi’s The Tree of Wooden Clogs (1978), it is an understated, pastoral epic.
2007 France 113 min. Color Letterboxed (1.85:1)
Enhanced for 16x9 TVs In French with optional English subtitles
SERGE LALOU and GILLES SANDOZ present
a film by NICOLAS PHILIBERT
BACK TO NORMANDY
JOSEPH and MARIE-LOUISE LEPORTIER NICOLE PICARD
ANNICK and MICHEL BISSON JACQUELINE MILLERE
ANNE, CATHERINE, CHRISTOPHE, OLIVIER PIERRE and YVONNE BOREL
NORBERT DELOZIER ROGER PESCHET CAROLINE ITASSE JANINE CALLU
NICOLE CORNUE BRUNO GAHERY and CLAUDE HEBERT
cinematography KATELL DJIAN and NICOLAS PHILIBERT
editing NICOLAS PHILIBERT and THADEE BERTRAND
produced by SERGE LALOU and GILLES SANDOZ
directed by NICOLAS PHILIBERT
A Co-production of LES FILMS D’ICI – MAIA FILMS and ARTE France Cinema,
with the participation of CANAL+, TPS STAR, and le Centre de la Cinematographie
© 2006 Les Films d’Ici – Maia Films – ARTE France Cinema |
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“...An extraordinary journey through time, memory and the repercussions of a baffling, bygone crime.”
– Jeannette Catsoulis, THE NEW YORK TIMES
“Richly rewarding... Philibert goes much deeper than a mere foray into how lives have changed: this is also a film about history...about memory, madness and motivation, and about various kinds and levels of documentation.”
– Geoff Andrew, SIGHT AND SOUND
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