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All good things must come to an end

To conclude my series of posts about why someone would ever shoot a movie in the North of France, I would like to share some of my thoughts on this.

Beyond the economic benefit, movies shot in the North of France participate to better the image or to promote the identity of Northern France.

A strong motivation for many directors who come from this area is to film their native land, such as Bruno Dumont, Dany Boom, Arnaud Desplechin, or Etienne Chatiliez for example.

The reputation and the mental image of the North of France is positively influenced by all these directors who each have their own eye and point of view.

Why there are so many filmmakers willing to film the North of France while there are not so many who want to film regions with strong identity like Bretagne or Pays-Basque?

I think the answer to that question is precisely because Northern France does not have already a well-developed identity, as its own history is strongly related with France’s history. Everything has to be done! Because of that, it is somewhere the creative freedom is unleashed making it a land extremely appealing to filmmakers.

To finish I want to add a last point: because the Northern France’s image is not fix in any traditions, if you want to speak about the North of France you have to scrutinize some social realities or relations between humans being. It is maybe why movies taking place in the North of France can touch everyone.  

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Life is a long quiet river

Life is a long quiet river, is a popular comedy movie directed by Etienne Chatiliez and shot in 1988, long before Welcome to the sticks, in several localities in Northern France.

The shooting took place in Villeneuve d’Ascq, Roubaix, Lille, Tourcoing and in Hénin-Beaumont.

The plot: in a maternity clinic, two children from families with utterly different social backgrounds are switched at birth. One goes on to live in an upper-middle-class family while the other goes in a poor family. Twelve years later, the mistake is discovered and the child living with the poor family is taken back by his parents but keeps in touch with his former family.

In an interview, the director Etienne Chatiliez said that he chose “the North of France because is an area we do not see a lot in cinema, because it is beautiful and because it is where I come from”.

Life is a long quiet river was an unexpected successful comedy. In France, it made more than two millions of entrances and it received seven nominations at the César awards.

Behind the comedy, Life is a long quiet river shed the light on a sociological reality. For Etienne Chatiliez the essence of humor is to laugh about serious things. First, we laugh, then we begin to think.

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Dunkirk

Dunkirk is a war film released in 2017 and written, directed and co-produced by Christopher Nolan that depicts the Dunkirk evacuation during World War II. It is the biggest production ever shot so far in the North of France.

The shooting took place in Dunkirk at the exact location of the real evacuation, while the street scenes were shot in another town, Malo-les-Bains, because most of the buildings in Dunkirk were destroyed during the war. The shooting began on 23thMay 2016 and lasted for more than six weeks. Some parts of the movie were also shot in the UK, the USA and the Netherlands. Christopher Nolan did his first spotting in Dunkirk in August 2015, in complete anonymity accompanied only by his key set decorator.

For the shooting in Dunkirk, the production recruited more than 1500 extras. The candidates had to be male between 18 and 50 years-old and they should not measure more than 1.83 m. The production did not allow them to cut their hair until the shooting if they were chosen. The production also looked for women in order to play nurses and they wanted no hair coloration or short haircut for them.

According to Malika Ait Gherbi Palmer, the director of Pictanovo (the main audiovisual fund agency of the North of France), the international tax shelter is playing a role in attracting some Hollywood productions to shoot in France.

Dunkirk shows that the North of France can welcome big and ambitious shooting. It was the first international production shot in the North of France I hope it will not be the only one…

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Welcome to the Sticks

The most famous film ever shot in The North of France is Welcome to the Sticks (original title: Bienvenue chez les ch’tis). It is a 2008 comedy film directed by Dany Boon, with Kad Merad and Dany Boon himself.

Philippe Abrams is the manager of the postal service in Salon-de-Provence in Southern France. To please his wife, he pretends to be disabled so he can be moved to a city near the beach. But his manager finds out and as a punishment, he is moved to Bergues, a city near Dunkirk. At first, he thinks the people are weird, he can’t understand them because they speak with an accent, etc. But in the end he is totally won over by the city and by his coworkers.

The movie was a really big success. The film nearly broke every box office in France with 20 489 303 entrances! With the success of the film, Bergues became a touristic city. The movie has had a big influence on the reputation of Bergues and it made the people in North of France look good. Now “Ch’ti” has become a brand: for example you can buy chips with “Ch’ti” flavor which is a “pommes frites” sauce (this sauce is really appreciated in Northern France).

To conclude I want to quote Dany Boon “A visitor cries twice up northern France: once on his arrival and once at his departure”… true proverb !

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Series

The international festival “series mania” devoted to TV shows took place this year in Lille, from April 27th to May 5th. The region welcomes a lot of shooting series. Some examples: 

-  « Le Baron noir »: a political series, broadcasted by Canal +, created by Eric Benzekri and Jean-Baptiste Delafon, and realized by Ziad Doueiri, with Kad Merad, Niels Arestrups and Anna Mougalis. The deputy of the North of France, Philippe Rickwaert, betrayed by his mentor, does everything to rebuild his career.

-  « Maman a tort »: is an adaptation of Michel Bussi ‘s novel, broadcasted by France 2, created by François Velle and Véronique Lechapy, and realized by François Velle himself. Malone, three years old, affirms that his mother is not his mother. Only the scholar psychologist trusts him. He asks officer Aubrais for help, but she is busy working on an other investigation.

-  « Les petits meurtres d’Agatha Christie »: A police series, broadcasted by France 2, created by Anne Giaffri and Murielle Magellan and realized by. The series is inspired by Agatha Christie‘s novels. It stages the inspector Jean Larosière and his adjoint the inspector Emile Lampion. The story takes place in the late fifties.  

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Shooting places

How did Northern France become the second main shooting place in France just after the Île-de-France, the area around Paris?

Northern France have a large diversity of landscapes. Pictanovo, the regional fund agency of the North of France, identifies more than 2000 shooting places in this region.

If you want beach landscapes, go to the North of France.

If you want mining landscapes, go to the North of France.

If you want big and imposing buildings, go to the North of France.

If you want cliffs, go to the North of France.

If you want historical buildings and landscapes, go to the North of France.

If you want lakes, go to the North of France.

If you want small villages and big cities, go to the North of France.

If you want factories, go to the North of France.

If you want country landscapes, go to the North of France.

If you want renaissance castels, go to the North of France.

If you want forests, go to the North of France.

To welcome shootings, the North of France can be proud of having more than 280 actors, and more than 800 technicians.

So, don’t wait any longer and go to the North of France to shoot your film, you will find everything you want!

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Berck-sur-mer

Do you know Berck-sur-mer? Have you ever heard of Berck-sur-mer? I don’t think so, but don’t worry it’s very normal.

Let me tell you more about this lovely place. It’s an average costal town which is siyuated in the south of the Côte d’Opal. The Côte d’Opal is the name of the northern littoral in France. Berck-sur-mer, with its weird name, has almost 15 000 inhabitants. It’s famous by the international kite fest. In brief, it’s the most banal and platidinous town we can imagine.

But Berck-sur-mer has been used repeatly as movies’ setting. Ten movies were shot in Berck-sur-mer. The oldest is Une si jolie plagein 1948 directed by Yves Allegert (also knew under the name of Yves Chaplain) with Gérad Philippe. It was shot in a villa’s ruin that have been bombarded. The most famous is Le Scaphandre et le papillonin 2006 directed by Julian Schanbel with Mathieu Almaric. Le Scaphandre et le papillon is the true story of a journalist who after suffered a strock can only move his left eyelid. He managed to write a book in the summer of 1996, the book was published a few days before his death. Some scenes of Gainsbourg vie héroique were also shot in Berck-sur-mer.

Not too bad for a banal coastal town…

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Bruno Dumont

We can’t speak about films and Northern France without saying few words about Bruno Dumont. He has a special connection with the North of France.

He has shot almost all his films in north of France, eight films in total (La vie de Jésus, Humanités, Flandres, Hadewijch, Hors Satan, Slack Bayand Jeannette: The childhood of Jeanne d’Arc) and one mini-series (P’tit Quinquin).

Bruno Dumont comes from Bailleul, a little town near to Lille, the main city of Northern France.

He has a fascination for this area. Landscapes and people which can be found in the North of France are Bruno Dumont’s material to practice his art of transfiguring reality. He sais that “the North is a wonderful theater to represent the whole of humanity”. For him north of France is one of the few places that has retained its character in the face of globalization which unifies everything.

Often in Bruno Dumont’s movies, actors aren’t professional. They are some amateurs, spotted on the site.

With Bruno Dumont’s cinema we see Northern landscapes differently.  We discover again this area. Unlike Dany Boon, Bruno Dumont doesn’t shoot these landscapes like postcard landscape in order to promote his area.

I hope you will enjoy discovering the North of France with the burlesque extravagance of Bruno Dumont.

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Welcome

- What is the common characteristic between Bienvenu chez les ch’tis, La vie d’Adèle and the last Bruno Dumont’s film, Slack Bay?

- All those movies have an actor in common?

- Wrong answer!

- They share the same compositor of soundtrack?

- No, try again!

- They were not made by the same director… They don’t talk about the same thing… really, I don’t know…

- make an effort, please!

- hum… they are all French movies?

- Yes! But we can be more precise, they all were shot in the North of France!

And they are not the only ones… Since the beginning of cinema more than two hundred films have been shot in the North of France.

In the collective imaginary, the North of France is a place where the sun never comes out, where people are stupid and consanguineous, where you can’t speak with local people because they only speak a strange and unintelligible dialect called “ch’ti”. In brief, it is the last place you choose to spend the holidays.

So why would ever someone shoot a movie in the North of France?

If you are interested in the answer of this crucial and fundamental question, I’m really happy to welcome you to my Tumblr!