David O'ConnellModern Life @ the Melbourne French Film Festival
March 12th 2009 02:10
Drifting down through the remote and isolated farmlands of France, the tracking shot that opens Raymond Depardon’s documentary takes us into God’s own country, a place where time stands still, the conveniences we take for granted as distant as the other side of the moon.
Born into a farming family himself, Depardon has assembled a loving tribute to these people through a modest collage of their daily lives - tending to stock, working the land, and shutting out the progress of time through an insulation borne of habitualised living. He visits half a dozen farmers on his journey, each with unique stories to tell of the routines, the essential components that define their desolate but contented lives.
The Privat family in the Cevennes region is given prominence and theirs is the most interesting story. Brothers Marcel, 88, and Raymond, 83, are both hardy souls who’ve never married, performing their daily duties like clockwork, stressing to the director that it’s not enough to simply like your job, you must be passionate to endure a lifetime in these parts. The amiable Marcel and the surly Raymond have only their nephew Alain to deal with, and his outsider wife Cecile is the cause of much conflict, the brothers uncomfortable with a female presence; they're especially disapproving of one who isn’t a local.
Depardon occasionally observes these people at work but the basis of his film is interviewing them face to face – often a difficult task, despite his obvious rapport with them, as they aren’t exactly articulate or loquacious types. Often dogged by uncomfortable silences, the director occasionally struggles to eek out an interesting observation or two during their sporadic conversations.
Wisely, time is taken to spread the focus around, to capture the next - perhaps last - generation of farming families as their fading fortunes dwindle, their chance at the prosperity of their forefathers having passed them by. Though ingrained in a life that trickles on in defiance of the 21st century, the idea of turning profit is barely considered, as Armandine Vella and her husband now realize. For a while she maintained a small number of goats on her property but with dreams of one day beginning a professional career and raising two young kids at the same time, she soon recognises the folly of her endeavors.
Depardon has visited many of these people in the past and has obviously earned their trust, though the novelty of having a camera pointed at their face is something they’ll never overcome, often staring at it like children with confusion, or in the case of 70 year old Germaine Chalaye, innocent amusement.
There’s a sense of sadness pervading this humane and tender documentary; watching Marcel Privat, the 88 year old sheep herder, sit silently contemplating his day, finally conquered by a host of ailments preventing him - for the first time in his life - from completing his daily tasks, is a painful one. He tells Depardon that “it’s all over” and he could be speaking, not only for his own decline into insubstantiality, but for that of the many fading generations of farmers in these beautiful, peaceful mountains, clinging to the only way of life they’ve ever known.
Modern Life is a fascinating, important document of both history and change; an affectionate, evocative tribute to these forgotten people, to discipline and simplicity, savoring every last vestige of the past for all its profoundly moving virtues.
Born into a farming family himself, Depardon has assembled a loving tribute to these people through a modest collage of their daily lives - tending to stock, working the land, and shutting out the progress of time through an insulation borne of habitualised living. He visits half a dozen farmers on his journey, each with unique stories to tell of the routines, the essential components that define their desolate but contented lives.
The Privat family in the Cevennes region is given prominence and theirs is the most interesting story. Brothers Marcel, 88, and Raymond, 83, are both hardy souls who’ve never married, performing their daily duties like clockwork, stressing to the director that it’s not enough to simply like your job, you must be passionate to endure a lifetime in these parts. The amiable Marcel and the surly Raymond have only their nephew Alain to deal with, and his outsider wife Cecile is the cause of much conflict, the brothers uncomfortable with a female presence; they're especially disapproving of one who isn’t a local.
Depardon occasionally observes these people at work but the basis of his film is interviewing them face to face – often a difficult task, despite his obvious rapport with them, as they aren’t exactly articulate or loquacious types. Often dogged by uncomfortable silences, the director occasionally struggles to eek out an interesting observation or two during their sporadic conversations.
Wisely, time is taken to spread the focus around, to capture the next - perhaps last - generation of farming families as their fading fortunes dwindle, their chance at the prosperity of their forefathers having passed them by. Though ingrained in a life that trickles on in defiance of the 21st century, the idea of turning profit is barely considered, as Armandine Vella and her husband now realize. For a while she maintained a small number of goats on her property but with dreams of one day beginning a professional career and raising two young kids at the same time, she soon recognises the folly of her endeavors.
Depardon has visited many of these people in the past and has obviously earned their trust, though the novelty of having a camera pointed at their face is something they’ll never overcome, often staring at it like children with confusion, or in the case of 70 year old Germaine Chalaye, innocent amusement.
There’s a sense of sadness pervading this humane and tender documentary; watching Marcel Privat, the 88 year old sheep herder, sit silently contemplating his day, finally conquered by a host of ailments preventing him - for the first time in his life - from completing his daily tasks, is a painful one. He tells Depardon that “it’s all over” and he could be speaking, not only for his own decline into insubstantiality, but for that of the many fading generations of farmers in these beautiful, peaceful mountains, clinging to the only way of life they’ve ever known.
Modern Life is a fascinating, important document of both history and change; an affectionate, evocative tribute to these forgotten people, to discipline and simplicity, savoring every last vestige of the past for all its profoundly moving virtues.
| 76 |
| Vote |
Comment by Matt Shea
20/20 Filmsight
Comment by Cibbuano
Hunt Famous
Orble Post of the Day
Fat Cult
Techbreak
Comment by David O'Connell
Screen Fanatic
and yes Cibby, definitely a way of life fast disappearing. But they must be doing something right, these people, they all seem to live to ripe old ages!