close, the film that represents Belgium in the 2023 Oscar nominations, begins with the portrait of a paradise. Two kids, Leo and Remi they play and run freely through a field of flowers. They are best friends and their summer together is Eden. Neither of them is afraid of being tender with the other: they sleep together, hug each other, whisper to each other, contemplate each other. Such closeness, emotional and physical, is natural to them, since they live and see each other as brothers. But this changes when they enter the school and are confronted with the silent codes of a world in which intimacy between men tends to arouse all kinds of pointing and labels. That’s where the masculine rites of passage that often lead to loneliness begin, the shame that creates distance arises. The expulsion from paradise will be cruel, the idyllic prairie will disappear and there will be devastating consequences.
This film of lukas dont was one of the winners at the Cannes Film Festival in 2022. It was carried in Grand Prix –considered a kind of second place, after the Palme d’Or– and since then its director has already been placed in a select group of contemporary filmmakers capable of portraying the complexities of youth and childhood. His gift for recounting emotional processes with young and novice actors, who often experience their first experience on a film set with him, has been praised. In his debut, girl, which also made it to Cannes and took the Camera d’Or, follows a trans teen who trains to become a ballet dancer. In it she worked with the young Victor Polster, a 14-year-old dancer with no film experience who also left Cannes with the Best Actor award in the section a certain look.
Since his early days as a filmmaker, Dhont has been haunted by the mysteries of growing up and the perspective of those who experience it. Perhaps because he himself has confessed to having found in the cinema the cure for the loneliness of his adolescence (he wanted to be a dancer, but a school event in which he felt singled out marked him forever and distanced him from dance). In the case of close he worked closely with two early teen actors, Eden Dambrine (Leo) and Gustav De Waele (Remi), whose characters illustrate how children their age begin to tune out the language of tenderness, softness, and intimacy in a world that does not give them space to cultivate them. A society that, according to the filmmaker, tends to think and represent masculinity from stereotypes.
In the film you complexify and explore the emotional nuances of the lives of these adolescents. What are the first decisions you made during the writing process?
Lucas Dont: Being the second film, we wanted it to be, in some way, a piece that was in dialogue with the first, which was, among many things, a story about femininity. And I think this movie is about masculinity. And there was also this reflection that generally we have filmed more men fighting each other than men holding each other up. So I guess there was this desire to see intimacy in the male universe on screen.
I reflected on the friendships I had with other children as a child. I remembered that moment when fear started to become a part of those relationships during puberty, since intimacy is not something that is represented much when it comes to men. You know, we usually tell guys that the place to find intimacy is in sex, not in their friendships. And I feel like women have done a better job of being there for each other, of building intimacy with each other, but because they’ve been given that space to do it. After reflecting and asking myself these things, and perhaps also from this political desire, this story emerged from a very personal perspective. A story about this young friendship and how we live in a world that separates youngsters.
In the movie, Leo and Remi become two sides of the same coin. How did you prepare these two young actors for filming?
Well, I think it has to do with not underestimating the intelligence of young actors. I think there’s a lot we can learn from listening to 13-year-olds. When you really listen to them there is a kind of pure radicalism in the things they say that as adults we have lost. You are still very connected to your heart. They don’t say things because they think it’s what is expected of them or to be accepted. They say them because that’s how they feel. So when I met Eden and Gustav, and we felt the chemistry between them, I gave them the script to read and we had a very open conversation. Know? They are at that fragile age; they are young people who are growing up in this world. They’re confronted with loss all the time, and I think that conversation we had shaped what the film ultimately is. They only read the script once because I wanted to avoid them feeling like they had to copy a text. They already have to do that all the time at school and in a way it limits their imagination a lot. I wanted to turn them into creative collaborators.
In the next six months of preparation, I placed a lot of emphasis on them finding the comfort and confidence to be the detectives of their own roles. From time to time he would ask them, casually, why they thought his character had reacted in one way or another. He didn’t give them the answer but let them give theirs. And I think that’s how they became very active in the process. So they can have the feeling that they are co-authors. If they understand what we’re doing and why we’re doing it, the process becomes much easier.
Do you think there is no single vision of what masculinity is?
Sure, I strongly believe in that. But I think we also live in a world where masculinity and virility are often seen as the same thing. But then again, I think masculinity is a collection of things, and we’ve been portraying it in a very one-dimensional way in the news and in art. There is a masculine stereotype, which has to do with not connecting and not expressing yourself. And that has created a lot of loneliness, I think. I think this film is about that and about the sadness that is generated. In the first 15 minutes of the film we are in the Garden of Eden, where love has no names or labels. We have all experienced that. And for many of us as adults it’s something we stop experiencing anymore. So I think there’s also a hint of nostalgia to it all. It is beautiful, but also devastating.
In Mexico, some filmmakers have begun to wonder precisely about how to connect more the language of tenderness with the cinematographic task, and that film sets also become connection spaces, instead of places with rites of passage that generate violence or loneliness. How has your language evolved in this regard when making films and what have you learned about your own vulnerability as a filmmaker?
Yes… I believe that the revolution can also be soft. We tend to think that it should be rude and brutal, but it can also be tender. I think that for a long time I believed that my tenderness and vulnerability were my weakness. I don’t think so anymore. Today I believe in the strength of vulnerability. When I was growing up I thought it was something to hide. I really think that we should believe more in the tenderness of men. We often depict them only as sources of brutality, while I am surrounded by people who are anything but. Today there is this incredible wave of feminism, necessary that deconstructs the patriarchy and the culture of the dominant of which men are also victims, not just perpetrators.
And as for the cinema there is a saying in which I believe a lot. It is an ideal, of course, and I am perfectible. I make many mistakes, but it goes like this: whoever wants to go fast goes alone, whoever wants to go far goes together. And I think that’s the way to make movies.
This film is about masculinity, but also about the fragility of friendship…
Yeah, I mean, friendships are incredibly fragile. Especially at those ages, when we tend to break things and relationships because we don’t know the impact this will have and we want to belong to a group and not so much to just one person. The broken heart for a friendship is an incredibly strong feeling, and despite that it is usually not portrayed as much in the cinema as the heartbreak of a couple. As human beings, when we grow we are transformed and that transformation requires different people in our lives. So yes, there is a lot of fragility in our friendships.
The closeness between Leo and Remi is evident, but we as viewers are also close to them: we see each of their facial expressions in close ups, the camera is also close. How did you work hand in hand with the cinematographer Frank van den Eeden and the actors to achieve that intimacy?
I think it was because we rehearsed for about six months and I included the camera from the first month. I start filming while we spend time together, so the camera becomes a kind of extension of ourselves and our time together. It becomes an organic object that is present while we are there, being us, and not when we are interpreting or acting. What began to happen is that the lines between documentary and fiction begin to blur.
As the actors start to get used to the camera, there is this transparency that happens because they have stopped caring about the presence of the camera. And we reach a point where they allow themselves to show emotions. It has to do with building comfort and trust but also creating a different relationship with the camera and that can only be done if you take the time to do it. And I wanted to dedicate a lot of time to that because this film is about implosions, about unsaid things, so we had to be able to see it in their gestures, in their faces.
Regarding the cinematography, close it is also expressed through colors such as red, magenta, flowers. What were you looking to achieve with that palette of shades?
Know? When I was a child, my mom was a teacher and in her spare time she always painted. I used to sit next to her, so since I was a child I realized how creativity is linked to expression through color. And although I think I have a very documentary style of approaching the actors, I also tend to look for a stylized approach in the visual language of the film, where color and light are symbolic. For example, in the flower fields, the colors are like from a watercolor fairy tale, one that is interrupted when the plot is transformed. When these machines arrive in the field, and the flowers are cut, they give way to the land that announces itself in a different way. A bit like the opening sequence in blue velvet by David Lynch.
In the middle of the film there is a moment where I needed the impact of the violence, but I don’t want to show it, I want to turn your imagination on, then this idea of the door ajar came up, a door that has been broken through and that is broken because someone wanted to enter that room desperately. I thought that would work well if there was also this red on the walls, something that would give us that eerie feeling.
Another example is Leo’s wardrobe, which starts with white. A symbol of the innocence of childhood. As the film progresses his clothing begins to darken to dirty yellows, browns. It is the representation of the loss of innocence.
close It can already be seen in some Mexican commercial theaters such as the Cineteca Nacional
the Cineteca Guadalajara, the Cineteca Monterrey, the Cine Tonalá and the Casa del Cine. On April 21 it will premiere on the platform MUBI.
jessica olive Journalist, editor at Cine PREMIERE and frustrated dancer in her spare time. She likes cinema, literature, tango, useless data and the opportunity to stay up late doing whatever.
