Laurent Cantet: Difference between revisions

▲His first feature film, with a screenplay written jointly with Gilles Marchand, was ''Ressources humaines'' (''[[Human Resources (film)|Human Resources]]'', 1999) about a management trainee working in his father's factory. This achieved both critical and popular success, and it won two [[26th César Awards|César awards]]. His next film ''L'Emploi du temps'' (''[[Time Out (2001 film)|Time Out]]'', 2001) continued his interest in employment issues, drawing upon a real-life case about a professional man who concealed his redundancy from his family. The screenplay was written jointly with Robin Campillo, who also worked on several of Cantet's later films. Social and political issues took on a more international perspective in ''Vers le sud'' (''[[Heading South]]'', 2005) about sexual tourism in Haiti. In ''Entre les murs'' (''[[The Class (2008 film)|The Class]]'', 2008) Cantet made a film which blended fiction and documentary exploring the daily life of a class of students in a Parisian school. The cast was composed entirely of non-professionals, including the teacher on whose book the film was based. The film won the Palme d'Or at the [[2008 Cannes Film Festival|Cannes film festival]]. Subsequent projects have taken Cantet to Canada for ''[[Foxfire: Confessions of a Girl Gang]]'' (2012) and to Havana for ''Retour à Ithaque'' (''[[Return to Ithaca]]'', 2014), working in English and Spanish respectively. <ref>Martin O'Shaughnessy. ''Laurent Cantet''. (Manchester University Press, 2015.) pp. 5-7.</ref><ref>[http://cinema.encyclopedie.personnalites.bifi.fr/index.php?pk=48856&_ga=2.181513255.1065164341.1612700679-1344600159.1581671816 Laurent Cantet] at Ciné-Ressources. Retrieved 10 May 2021.</ref><ref name="lacinetek" />

▲In France Cantet has demonstrated a long-standing concern for illegal migrant workers (the ''sans-papiers'') and has supported a collective of French film-makers (the Collectif des cinéastes pour les sans-papiers) who have made a number of short films to bring wider attention to the risks faced by migrant workers. Another aspect of Cantet's interest in social issues is reflected in his preferred method for developing a film, particularly those which feature non-professional actors. He has said that he likes to give a lot of attention and time to the casting, seeking people who will play not themselves but a role similar to their own in real life of which they have a natural understanding (e.g. a factory manager and a trade unionist in ''Ressources humaines'', the pupils in ''Entre les murs''), and then to involve his actors in developing not only their own characters but sometimes the script as well, in a process of workshops and rehearsals.<ref>Martin O'Shaughnessy. ''Laurent Cantet''. (Manchester University Press, 2015.) pp. 7-10.</ref>

▲This method was used by Cantet for ''Entre les murs'', and he returned to it in ''L'Atelier'' (''[[The Workshop (film)|The Workshop]]'', 2017) in which he worked with a group of young people from [[La Ciotat]] on the Mediterranean coast, exploring their present-day problems in a former shipbuilding town which has been radically transformed since its industrial past. Their fictional project in the film shows them collaborating in a workshop to write a novel about their town and drawing on their own experiences to enrich it, mirroring aspects of Cantet's own method in making the film.<ref>Press dossier for [https://medias.unifrance.org/medias/64/181/177472/presse/l-atelier-dossier-de-presse-francais.pdf ''L'Atelier''] at unifrance.org. Retrieved 10 May 2021. Archived at [https://web.archive.org/web/20180217142012/https://medias.unifrance.org/medias/64/181/177472/presse/l-atelier-dossier-de-presse-francais.pdf the Wayback Machine].</ref>