About Joan: Who plays young Isabelle Huppert?

The birth of the project

A lot of questions and desires were born about Joan, which arose in Laurent Lariviere after the creation of I Am a Soldier (2015). The director recalls: “Together with François Decodts, my co-writer, we wanted to write a portrait of a woman, in the form of a romantic film that takes place in different periods, in several countries. Melodrama, but crossed. Comedy.”

“Above all, I wanted to depict her relationship not only with her son, but with the whole world, with freedom, imagination, humor, authority… a portrait accompanied by the desire to believe the stories that are in the cinema. When Joan directly addresses the audience at the beginning of the film, she promises to bring her memories of her life, which are also fictional.”

Simplify the story

If, a priori, this story may seem complicated given its different temporal levels, Laurent Lariviere tried to make it as fluid as possible. Together with the editor Marie-Pierre Frappier, he discovered connections between eras that were not necessarily written:

“I’m thinking particularly of the connection where Doug takes Joan by the hand in the cafe. She closes her eyes and we see them as young people in an embrace… this connection is sensational. Other times there are more connections. humorous”, explains the director and continues:

“Like when Joan says ‘Holiness I am everything’ and then we see a leather-clad, platinum blonde walking to hard rock music. . . . Sequences sometimes directly address the question we might have started, and sometimes somewhat. A conflicting relationship . . .”

“We tried to keep the variety back and forth, not to settle into the system. We wanted the audience to be constantly surprised and share different emotions.”

soundtrack side

Jérôme Rebotier’s music aims to contribute to the film’s romantic tone. Laurent Lariverie asked him to work on some rather silly scores, such as the character of Joan. The director explains: “I think it’s very beautiful the way in which he finally managed to combine life and sadness as the title of the film. “About” gives impetus to the sentence, something very alive. A conversation… or a story…”

British talent

Scottish Freya Mavor Chosen as a youngster for the role of Joan (Isabel Huppert). Laurent Larivière clarifies: “Her freckles could work for Isabelle Huppert. I also liked that she was bilingual and thus could have fun with her French accent. She brings a lot of joy and sensuality to Joan in her youth.

The filmmaker adds of Irish actor Eana Hardwick, who plays Doug (Stanley Townsend) as a young man: “I didn’t know her. An Irish casting director suggested it to me. Eana has a light smile and a devastating charm. It’s immediately clear why Joan will fall in love with her.”

Contrasting aesthetics

Director Laurent Lariviere wanted to make a film with a contrasting aesthetic, so that the audience can clearly identify the eras (but without being aesthetically pleasing). For this, he turned to director of photography Celine Bozon. The filmmaker recalls:

“I wanted us to go from one era to another, without being brutal. With the color range, we got a strong bias. In Ireland, we’re in warm tones: browns, oranges, greys… the atmosphere is colder in the German period. , with this very bluish atmosphere.”

“And in Mariposa, the family home, we’re a bit more sunny, with yellows, greens… and we’ve worked on texture, specifically adding grain to the Irish period. Memory is relaxation. Image is not intended. Let’s be realistic.”

“I wanted this impurity to be found in our aesthetic choices. Beyond the anecdote of the situation, which can be funny or dramatic, what I am interested in is capturing what is not seen, what circulates among the beings that lie beneath the story. I make movies to capture the invisible.”