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[27 Aug 2003|06:28pm] |
The following is a small transcribed excerpt from Juliette Binoche's appearance on the Charile Rose show January 21st, 1997. I rediscovered this interview on my desktop tonight and in rereading it, was once again astounded to remember the amazing fact that Kieslowski created his masterpiece films IN ONE TAKE. Two, if the camera failed. As he told Danielle Stok, coming from his experience at Lodz he felt it was highly immoral to waste film on the ego. On multiple takes for neurotic actors. He could never bring himself to do it.
CHARLIE ROSE: What was [Kieslowski] like as a director?
JULIETTE BINOCHE: First of all, he was a good person, which I think goes together sometimes, you know--
CHARLIE ROSE: Of being--
JULIETTE BINOCHE: --a good person being a good director because you-- you know, they try to help you, you know? Some directors, they don't care about actors, you know? They don't try to help you. You know, they're more interested to what they think and what they-- you know, how you should play that because they thought about it, you know? It's like you have to be in the puzzle, you know, and too much what they thought about. And making movies for me, it's different because it's-- it's teamwork again. You know, you're trying your best to get as close as possible with the other. And I think Kieslowski was-- he didn't care about himself, you know, as I didn't care about myself. It was about the story of the film and doing the best as we could.
CHARLIE ROSE: How much of what-- of your talent and skill and craft as an actor is just who you are naturally? What does-- the person that you were born, the characteristics that you have, as much as it is study and practice and rehearsal and hard work-- how much of it is just you were born with certain something-- luminescence-- certain something?
JULIETTE BINOCHE: So you want me to define--
CHARLIE ROSE: Yeah. I mean, you know, it just seems that you have something that's beyond craft, too, I mean, that you brought to the--
JULIETTE BINOCHE: Well, your experience and-- it's so-- you know, when I-- when I involve myself in a movie, I-- sometimes I know without knowing.
CHARLIE ROSE: Yeah.
JULIETTE BINOCHE: I know because it's my intuition, so I work mostly with my intuition and it comes out of probably childhood and--
CHARLIE ROSE: Yeah.
JULIETTE BINOCHE: But I don't have a specific, you know, way of working. It depends on the movie and it changes all the time. Like, I had to [unintelligible] myself with the director sometimes. Kieslowski would do only one take, rehearse-- rehearse, like, four or five times and then do just one take. And I was used to doing another film with a young director called Leos Carax, which was Les Amants du Pont Neuf.
CHARLIE ROSE: Yeah.
JULIETTE BINOCHE: We did about 40 takes each time, sometimes more than 40 takes. And so it was the reverse for me and I felt very uncomfortable to start with. I asked Kieslowski, ``It's impossible. You know, you have to allow me to do another take, at least two takes so I can make a mistake.'' And I was so furious sometime because when the camera was-- you know, didn't work, we would do another take because of the camera or because of sound, because of whatever, light, whatever. And I say, ``Well, let's say that I'm a machine and it doesn't work and that technically I had a problem. Is that okay with you?''
CHARLIE ROSE: Yeah.
JULIETTE BINOCHE: And so the first month of shooting, you know, he let me have my second take most of the time, but it was a fight each time, which is very tiring, you know, for me and-- and so the second month I was so exhausted by it, I said, ``Well, okay. It's your film. One take-- it's your problem, it's not mine.''
CHARLIE ROSE: And so what did he say, ``Fine''?
JULIETTE BINOCHE: Oh, he said, ``Fine,'' you know, because he said, you know, ``It's nonsense to do another take when you can do it only one take which is just fine.''
CHARLIE ROSE: Yeah.
JULIETTE BINOCHE: Also he was used-- you know, in Poland he was used to--
CHARLIE ROSE: Shooting fast.
JULIETTE BINOCHE: --do just one take because there was no money.
CHARLIE ROSE: No film.
JULIETTE BINOCHE: No film.
CHARLIE ROSE: Right.
JULIETTE BINOCHE: No-- no nothing. You just have, you know, as condensed as possible.
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