Katalog 2013.pdf - Visions du Réel

atelier – laila pakalnina
181
picas
there, camera on the tripod and waiting
for insects and animals to show up.
Actually after this film I started feeling
confident in filming human beings: I’m
prepared to wait. We’ve been filming for
almost two years and, once I started editing,
immediately came the question of
the music. I usually don’t use music, but I
realized quite soon that I actually needed
it with this film. So, I was at the Venice
Film Festival in 2003 with my film Pitons
(The Python) and there I met Shigeru
Umebayashi who, among many other
things, composed the music for Wong
Kar-wai’s In The Mood for Love and who
is very famous. But I didn’t know who he
was when I met him; I just met a composer
from Japan. We exchanged cards
and he gave me a CD with his music. A
few months later I listened to the CD, discovered
his wonderful music and asked
the producer to sign him for Leiputrija.
Only after that, out of curiosity, I Googled
his name and realized how famous he
was and what he did. The fact that he
accepted to compose the soundtrack of
Leiputrija, despite the ridiculously little
money we could afford to pay him, is like
a fairy tale to me. We sent him the final
edit and I remember the moment when
we received the music as a very moving
one: everything was just perfect. That’s
actually my first and almost only experience
with composed soundtracks. The
second one was with Picas (Pizzas) even
if it was completely different, because
when you think about music you probably
don’t think about the hip-hop you
find in Picas. But that was exactly what
I needed for the film. It’s the poetry of
this generation. I can’t say that poetry is
dead, but 20 years ago people were still
reading poetry and now, for many people,
that is the way in which they exchange
their feelings about life.
I would like to go from Leiputrija to
Par Dzimteniti (Three Men and a Fish
Pond), which looks like a “zoom-out”
from the dumpsite in order to include
human beings. What is the relationship
between these two films
The films are absolutely related in many
ways, starting from the presence of
Maris as a cameraman: it is the same
kind of filming approach, the same
observation and the same waiting for
things to happen. It’s actually the location
itself which gave us the possibility
to see human beings living at the same
rhythm of all the other beings which
surrounded us. Looking at nature, and
human beings as part of it, definitely
helps in understanding ourselves better.
And yes, it’s also very important to smile
a bit at ourselves.
That is a feeling which I think we can
find throughout all your filmography. It
seems that, in a very tender way, you
systematically point out the clumsiness
of humans and often the smile
comes from the way your characters
move. Actually in your films, both fiction
and documentaries, we can find a
pretty exhaustive inventory of means
of transport: boats, bikes, cars, trucks,
trains, buses, mopeds… Where does
this fascination come from
Well, it’s difficult to answer, but it’s
probably not by coincidence that the
very first film by the Lumière brothers
was on a train. And I can guess that
they chose that subject because it was
moving. I think that is the same reason
for which we can find so many means
of transport in my films, and also
because they are not just moving, but
carrying people, carrying us, from one
point to another. One of my future films
could actually be on a means of transport
again. The producers of Autobuss
asked me to make Autobuss 2, in order
to capture all the changes which have
occurred from the time we filmed. I
didn’t want to make another film about
a bus and he said: “OK, let’s make
one about planes then”. So I started
thinking about this peculiar route by
Uzbekistan airways, which goes from
Tashkent to New York via Riga. I don’t
know if and when I will do it, but I can
feel that there is a film there, and it
would be again a film focusing on a
means of transport.
It strikes me in a way when you say
“there is a film there”, as happened
for your last film Chimney. I somehow
have the impression that you are constantly
open to receiving inspirations
and that you actually manage to realize
all your projects. Have you ever been
forced to abandon a project Have
you ever experienced frustration like, I
guess, most of your colleagues
Well, I think that if “there is a film” then
you can make it. I come from a country
where there is very little money for films,
especially for the kind of films I do. But
at the same time I can say that the most
important thing is to have an idea, which
triggers the desire to make a film. If you
have that, you can do it. That doesn’t
mean I want people to work for free,
but probably that’s one of the reasons
for which in my filmography I have more
documentaries than fiction. My films are
cheap. The last film for example: the
crew is composed of the cameraman,
a sound operator who is also sound
director, an editor and I’m producing it.
Filmmaking for me is not an “alibi” to
remain seated on one idea for ten years.
You might need a few years in order to
realize one, but for most ideas you just
need to do something with them as
soon as you can, because you change
constantly and you will most probably
start to feel the need to go towards your
next idea.