"I love people who sweat"
  

Posté le 12.10.2021

During a masterclass that was inevitably light-hearted, the whimsical Édouard Baer shared, through digressions and jokes, anecdotes that only he could unlock.

A cinema of encounters

It's difficult to have an overall vision of one's career when you are a succession of small accidents! When, like me, you were not born a filmmaker, you have to be fascinated by someone you want to film. You have to love someone to film them. What I like is to meet people who move me, who are singular, amazing. I like strong personalities, who live in their own way, and then I film them to be with them. Cinema gives depth to people who seem normal. Some filmmakers manage to make us love them infinitely. For my part, I film unique people whom I need to admire. For example, Benoit Poolevorde!

The art of escape

The empty chair is a beautiful thing. I find it very beautiful, someone who doesn't show up. Like Dutronc, who should have starred in a Spielberg film. But he preferred his cats. I like magnificent losers. In fact, I've always preferred Marcello Mastroianni to John Wayne. In life, I love heroes, but those with the souls of children.

© Loic Benoit

The ridiculous

I'm fascinated by the ridiculous, by embarrassment, by people who get tangled up, who sink into themselves. I love people who blush, sweat and cry. Like those couples who kick each other under the table during meals. We're all like that. We just wish there were fewer witnesses to observe it.

His creative process

In film, the wonderful thing is to find solutions for others, to film them. In the theatre, you do it to save your skin! I can't plan - I like to do everything live. I like to have the impression that it was tonight and not any other night. I like to be able to capture that on film. If you can be responsive, I'm sure it translates on screen. We also like to scare ourselves a bit in our very lucky lives.

Édouard the actor

I was very bad for a long time because I could never forget the camera. I admire actors who, in the midst of all this machinery, manage to do impeccable things. That's something I'll never be able to do. I don't need to know that we’re filming. So I isolate myself in a kind of bubble.

His monologue in Asterix, Mission Cleopatra

I had a minor role and there were cinema legends all around me. This monologue is all thanks to Alain Chabat's talent for putting his actors at ease. It wasn't easy. It was a luxury to shoot an improvisation by the guy who had the eighth role! I did it to amuse Alain, to make him laugh. You never really know why people get attached to these lines, and the monologue has become a classic without me understanding why.

Interview by Benoit Pavan