Festival Daily: Dumont Up Close

Bruno Dumont is somewhat of an intense character, and this is reflected in the brutal impact of his films.

FLANDERS, his latest feature, is filled with violence and grittiness, in terms of both war and sex. Indeed, Dumont’s aim in making this film was to portray the interlinking of these two parallel themes. “I believe that man is fundamentally a warrior, and that an amorous relationship is like warfare. Possessing a woman is like possessing a piece of land. When there is rivalry between two men for a woman, it’s war, just like when there is rivalry between two men for a piece of land, it’s war. So there’s a strong connection between love and war”

The title FLANDERS, and the place it refers to, is ideally suited to its two main themes. As Dumont puts it, the word has ‘strong connotations’ – of Flemish painting, and above all the First World War. “It’s a loaded word, and this makes it a good grounding (he uses the French word patte, which literally means plaster, or dough, capturing a sense of malleability which evokes both the culinary and the earthly, in a way that only French can) – for evoking things which go deep, just like earth that is constantly changing and evolving.”

FLANDERS can be seen as a development of THE LIFE OF JESUS, Dumont’s earlier film, by way of the character, Pierrot who features in both. But FLANDERS is also a response to a more general atmosphere of war “which is very present in the world today, inscribed into our imagination as a result of television. I wanted to make a film about love, but mixed with all these different things. So I made a film about love with a background of war.”

But how do all the strands – love, earth, violence, painting – tie up? Firstly, this part of NorthernFrance is Dumont’s native country (he was born in Bailleul) and a
place he has already shot previous films. So there is already a strong emotional connection to the place. But his choice of location is also strategic: “Today, cinema is filled with cliché – by this I mean, always filming in the same kind of location. There are so many films in which we recognise the places; we’ve seen it all? The North [of France] is different because it provides a good grounding (he uses the word patte once again) for making things stand out. It’s much harder to make things stand out in places which have been filmed in a lot.”

Making things stand out is something Dumont is rather vehement about, not only in his personal – and rather controversial- views on the violence that links sexuality and warfare, but also his opinion of independent cinema versus Hollywood.

“When I make a film, my sole aim is to make the story convincing. I don’t make films to make a particular statement. I make a film to hold up to you, by means of cinema, a story. It’s very humble…” Dumont admires filmmakers such as Dreyer, Pasolini and Rossellini,
whom he refers to as ‘mystical’ filmmakers. “By this I mean that, through the simple act of filming a face, they’re reaching out towards something else… you could call it a search for deep truth, it’s something almost metaphysical.”

Dumont attacks Hollywood for being a cinema of “pure entertainment… It has the opposite effect of making one think. For me, ‘being entertained’ is the same as not thinking: Cinema is an art, just like painting or literature. When people look at a Van Gogh, they talk about spirituality. But cinema is being destroyed by commerce. I believe that cinema is first and foremost an art. I believe in the art of cinema, and I vomit at industrial cinema – by this I mean the kind of film made solely to attract audiences, and to make money”

With his rugged face and gleaming eyes, Dumont is bursting with Gallic vigour and charm. And he certainly isn’t shy of stating his opinion on cinema of the present. But how does he envisage cinema of the future?

“Cinema is symptomatic of its era. Therefore, it reflects consumerism, our materialist society. Cinema will change when men begin to think. I don’t think that cinema can change the world, I think that the world will change cinema. But I believe in the power of cinema… for me it’s a revolutionary act.”

Volatile, occasionally offensive, yet irrepressibly charming, Bruno Dumont the man, like his latest film is bold and uncompromising, yet expressive, intelligent and captivating.

Marina Bradbury