French love affair
DAVID and Stéphane Foenkinos’ first film, a short called Une Histoire De Pieds, was a love story told from the point of view of feet.
Audiences would be wise not to expect the conventional from the French brothers’ first feature, the romantic comedy-drama Delicacy.
Audrey Tautou plays Nathalie, a Parisian whose new husband dies in a road accident. In the years that follow, the young widow focuses on work, until one day, without even understanding why, Nathalie kisses her schlubby Swedish co-worker Markus (François Damiens).
So begins an unlikely romance, as the odd couple tries to understand their new-found love.
This is an adaptation of David Foenkinos’ bestselling novel La Délicatesse. “I’ve written 10 books, and many of them are in the process of being adapted for film,” David says.
“Each time I have always said I don’t want to be involved or write the script. Delicacy is an exception for me because when I finished the story I felt inside that I hadn’t entirely finished with this story yet, and that I could create more from it. But I think it will be my only adaptation.”
Stéphane says: “We don’t want to make a living adapting David’s books. We spent three years with this story, and David spent another two before that writing it. We would have to love the story to spend that long with it.”
The two men have a relaxed rapport not all brothers are lucky to achieve. It made their time on set together remarkably drama-free.
“We prepare a lot in advance, and discuss everything together,” David says. “That was best for us as this was our first movie. Because I wrote the book and the screenplay, we knew these characters very well, and understood exactly what we wanted.”
“We could always talk to each other without offending one another,” Stéphane says. “On set, it was always our voice rather than just mine or his.”
Both men can’t believe their luck that they landed Audrey Tautou for the lead role. “She was our dream casting,” David says. “Audrey only makes one film a year, and she might receive a thousand scripts. She hadn’t made a movie in two years, and had been working largely on stage. But she liked the story and wanted to work with us.”
Delicacy, with its whimsical, bittersweet Gallic tone, brings to mind Tautou’s iconic title role in Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s Amélie (2001). It doesn’t seem like the first time the brothers have been told this.
“We liked Amélie very much,” Stéphane says. “We were in New York last week, and they showed some clips of some of Audrey’s previous roles. There was a scene from Amélie and people still couldn’t take their eyes off the screen.
“Of course, she knows that every single day of her life she will be reminded of her role in that movie, and she’s very happy and grateful for that. Even if we didn’t want to, people would make the comparison. So we try to make a wink at Jean-Pierre Jeunet in our movie.”
French audiences have found the casting of Tautou’s leading man, François Damiens, more disconcerting.
“He’s a huge star, a very big comedian in France,” says Stéphane. “It’s like casting Ricky Gervais. François is very famous for doing these Candid Camera-like pranks on TV, and he plays these horrible, outrageous characters. But in real life he’s much closer to this character Markus. That’s why, sometimes, he’d feel really uncomfortable just doing nothing because he was so right in everything he did.”
Both men laugh out loud at the suggestion that only two men could have written and directed a romcom where the most ordinary guy on the planet stands a real chance of getting with Audrey Tautou.
“Maybe it is a guy’s romcom,” says David. “But it can give some good ideas to women as well: just kiss a man randomly and you’ll never know what might happen.”
Prior to working together, the brothers had carved out their own high-profile, individual careers in France.
Stéphane has spent 20 years working as a casting director for the likes of Jean-Luc Godard and François Ozon, not to mention Mike Newell, Florian Van Donnersmarck, Terrence Malick, and most recently Woody Allen, on his Oscar-winning hit Midnight in Paris.
He has also written for comedy performers and the stage, one of his most recent projects being a musical about Judy Garland.
David (37) is something of a literary sensation in France. An arts graduate of the Sorbonne (not to mention a trained jazz musician), he has published 10 novels in as many years, as well as penning a stage play, Célibataires, and writing a monthly column for Psychologies magazine.
La Délicatesse has sold close to 1m copies in France and won 10 literary prizes, in addition to making the shortlist for the four biggies, the Goncourt, Femina, Renaudot, Médicis and Interallié.
La Délicatesse is the French equivalent of British writer David Nicholls’ all-conquering romance One Day, which Nicholls also adapted for last year’s screen version starring Anne Hathaway.
“I haven’t read One Day, but a lot of people have recommended it,” David says. “Funnily enough, they’ve just released the paperback of One Day in France, and it’s now just behind me in the bestseller list.”
Still, it won’t be too much of a blow if Nicholls polls past him: after all, David has been firmly sequestered on the bestseller chart for the last 18 months.
The Foenkinos spoke to the Irish Examiner while visiting London for a sell-out French movie festival, and they have their own thoughts on why their national cinema seems to be having what the buzz-making industry would describe as “a moment” right now.
“It’s to make up for our bad politicians,” says Stéphane. “I think what’s very important is that we still have such a wide range of talent. For instance, we’re the cinema with the most women filmmakers.
“You go to the Césars [the French Oscars], and in the same category you have Alain Cavalier, who’s 80 years old and made a film with his iPhone, alongside Poliss [directed by French actress Maïwenn], and The Artist. There’s diversity in our cinema because there are a lot of risk-takers.”
David says: “Look at The Artist. Its success was a big surprise. It was a huge risk-taking movie. We’re happy with this big moment for French cinema, and we hope to take advantage of it. If everyone loves French film right now, we’re here and open for business.”
He pauses to consider the success of Michel Hazanavicius’ multi-Oscar-winner, and says: “Perhaps we should have put a dog in our movie.”
* Delicacy opens on Apr 13.
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