Transcript. Tavernier. OnJeanPierreMelville.

1.      I rememberverywell thefirstday I metJeanPierreMelville. I was writing aboutFilms. Thefirstarticle was aboutMelville, and I wanted to do an interview. So I went to see him, and I did a small interview of him. And from then on, Melville asked me what I wanted to do, I said, I would like to direct. So he said, Come meet me and I will try to help you. And he did with me what he did with some young people. We became, how you say, his protégé.  He was taking, most of the time, It happened toVolkerSchlondorff, it happened to many people, long ride. We were driving inParis, and he was explaining us place were related to the story of underworld, it's how PierreLeFou lived there, ** there, it’s in this house somebody betrayed someone, it was a place where people were meeting in theRésistance. So, I mean, we had threehoursfourhoursdrive, sometimes a bite to eat, going to oneortwomovies. And after midnight, the ride was going on, I was brought home in the room I was renting at threeinthemorning, and thenextday thesamething. So had that life, I saw a lot of films with him, and I see echoes of those films inDoulosLe et DeuxièmeSouffleLe. One of them especially, which is CrimeWave[Completed in1952, released in1954], and I know, because Melville loved that film. During the scene where JeanDesailly was chewing toothpick, this come fromCrimeWave. Melville told that to me. He said, I will give him thesamekind of toothpick ofSterlingHayden. And he borrowed things. Thesameway he borrowed [copied] shots fromOddsAgainstTomorrow[1959] The wall ofOddsAgainstTomorrow can be found in many Melville'sfilms, including films which have nothing to do with copandgangster. Laughter ofTavernier. He was obssessed [with] wallpaper, and he was asking his productiondesigner to copy it. Omitted.

2.      I will neverforget thefirstday I came to his studio when he made me visit twostages, the bar, and he was living just upstairs. It was always like night inside, because he had insomnia. And the stairs to the apartment I think you can see in all those films. And certainly inDoulousLe et SamouraïLe. I mean, you can see somebody climbing in fact toMelville’sapartment. Omitted.

3.      He gave me my firstjob, like firstAD. SecondAD was VolkerSchlondorff. As thefirstAD was firedimmediately before the film started, because there was something had to be in war with oneortwoorthreepersons in the crew, oneortwoorthreepersons in the cast, and he was at war with them, it was deadly. And he ccould be, at the same time, a few hours after, themostcharming and delicious man in the world. Omitted.

4.      At the beginning of the film, Melville says, I’m saying goodmorninghello to everybody, and I will not say during film ever, because it’s a big waste of time. Yet calculated by saying good morning to everybody in the crew, he was losing like threeminutes every day. That was something. This would recount for the whole movie. I will neversay hello to you after that. Omitted.

5.      And at the end, Melville said to me, You are hopeless as anAD, which I was. But he did something great to me. He said, I think you can be good as a pressagent And I did, and I was hired byGeorgesDeBeaugard, JeanLucGodard, ClaudeChabrol, **, many directors, threefoursfouryears. Being a pressagent forMelville, you were escaping that [burden]. Laughter ofTavernier. That kind of attitude, which was, I mean, it was getting great result, but I alwaysthought that there must be other way to get what you want. Omitted.

6.      And I became really thepressagent, because Belmondo fired guy who was supposed to be a pressagent. His name was RichardBalducci, who published, he did not publish himself, but he let publish the kind of scandalous column aboutBelmondo in theworst[slander] gossipy. So I [was] there when Belmondo in theStudioJenner was chasingBalducci, caughtBalducci, and forced him to eat the newspaper, and Balducci says, Don't do that to me. I'm a coworker, I’m a coworker, don't do that to me, and Belmondo was putting in the newspaper in his mouth, and then Balducci never came and I took over the film. Laughter ofTavernier. It's how I took over DoulosLe after that scene, which could be DoulosLe. I mean, Belmondo was behaving exactlylike the character in the film. Omitted.

7.      Thefirstshot was start[ing] fromSacréCœurLe. I can seeMelville explaining me in the editingroom that it was a statement he was making againstPigalle and the underworld. He was going away fromBobLeFlambeur. That’s the meaning of thefirstshot. I was taking my distance from the world ofBobLeFlambeur by that zoomer. Omitted.

8.      Shooting went veryveryfast and efficient. And I say, Veryveryfewshots. He knew where to put the caméra. He knew what he wanted. There was no improvisation. What is striking when you see the film is the ["]economy["]. How eachshot counts. There was no coverage. Veryverylittle coverage. You could not edit the film ofMelville in twentydifferentways. Eightypercent of the film was alreadythere in the editingroom. And the lighting byNicolasHayer, who was one of those cameramen that Melville loved, but he was verycharming man, which Melvilled sued at the end of the film, because [of] the shot of the car falling from the cliff. There were twocameras, and NicolaHayer was on one, the operator at the other. ByEconomy, Melville did not want to hire another cameraman, another operator. And Nicolas was the cameraman, not the operator, and he forgot to push the button. Onlyoneshot, nottwo of the stunt. So he sued him. Melville loved to sue. He was in obssession with suing, I mean, actors, part of the crew, coproducteurs. He was alwayssuing his producer, coprucer, exhibitor, he was absolutelyobssessive about that. I mean, talking of an obssession. When he was called by a producer, I mean, I witnessed that onDeuxièemeSouffleLe. I was in his office when he was called, somebody proposing him DeuxièmeSouffleLe. He immediatelyopened the file, and he put thecaseDeuxièmeSouffleLe. Laughter ofTarvernier. It was a legalcase before ** on the contract. Omitted.

9.      InDoulosLe, theonlydisagreement, and I've seenBelmondo questionMelville several times, was the way the women were cast. Belmondo felt that Melville took amateurs, which were notgood and not up to the quality of the film. He was critical of that. And I think he was right, I think he was right. Melville cast his secretary, the girl who was tied up to the [radiator], Melville'ssecretary. Melville does not how to handle women, does not know how to direct them. I don't think he’s interested. It's true of all of his gangsterfilms. Mostimportant things are the men, are the relationship between the men, and the masculine environment. And the feeling Melville deals with are masculine feelings, loyalty, freindship, betrayal, and he’s verygood at that. I don't think Melville was a great screewriter of original stories. [I agree] One must not forget DoulosLe is a veryfaithful adaptation of a good book byPierreLesou. Omitted.

10.   He wanted to describe french gangster at, behaving in fact as american gangster, but put in frenchbackground. In the end, Melville’sobssession was to be the equal ofWilliamWyler. He was the director he was admiring above all the american director. Films as the directors, all masterpiece or shit. There was nothing in between. There was not a film which [was] good thing, but it's not totallysuccesful or veryinteresting. That was the word which he was never using. It was fourstars or that. Like everything fromWilliamWyler is great. And people againstMelville, I'm thinking of people likeJacquesRivette, for instance, alwayssaid that problem withMelville and his gangsterfilm[s] is he wanted to do tragedy, greektragedy by magnifying characters, who were, in fact, inReallife, dispecable. It's something the french screenwriter, MichelAudiard, kept telling me. He said, French gangster, most of them had been at work with frenchGestapo. They were antisemitic. They tortured jews, Résistance. They betrayed everybody. They were betraying each other. You cannot make tragedy with them, you cannot. But Melville succeeded in creating a world of his own, which was, normally he was thinking he was making an american film inFrance, but it's not a copy of an american film. It's not a copy of theReality. It's something completelyspecial completelypersonal, and you find that since thefirstshot ofDoulosLe. It’s veryclear. It’s really thosetwofilms who put him in the mainstream. Before that, he was takenseriously by a few filmbuff, CahiersDuCinéma, people like that, but not by the system. So they were veryveryimportant. And at the end, I heard him veryoften say, inFrance, there are onlytwodirectors, Cluzot and myself. He said, Cluzot, lately. Laughter ofTarvernier. That’s. So I was, when I started making films, I was glad that he had disappeared, because I would have feared his judgement.

11.   Melville was veryproud, all the people with my aim worked with him, all of us where we fought with him, and there was a separation. I had to fight overAînéDesFerchauxLe[1963], which I did not like at all, and I told him, Melville, that I was, I didn’t say that I didn't like the characters at all, but I had a lot of reservation about the film. I think the film was, compared to the great novel bySimenon, full of flaws and it was missed. And he never forgave me. Some years passed by, onenight, had a phonecall. This is JeanPierre. I read your book, [TrenteAnnéesDuCinémaAméricain]. It's great. It's a masterpiece. One of thebestbook written aboutFilms. I said, Thank you, JeanPierre. I mean, out of the blue, full of priase. He said, I would like to show you mylastfilm, DeuxièmeSouffleLe. And he showed me his  film, and it was veryimpressive, and I saidimmediately, I will fight for it, I want to fight for it. It's how we started to work together, and we were veryveryclose during those months. He premiered the film inMarseille. During the traintrip, he asked me, After all those weeks spent together, Have you any kind of reservation about my film. I said, There was a scene in the stickup. I mean, before, maybe there is a little moment, which is tiny bit toolong. He said, This is thebestmoment in the film. I stopped arguing. Laughter ofTavernier. Omitted.

12.   It's verystriking, with veryfewwords and fewshots, a lot is said. And I was looking at films, where you have many things describe that twopersons are pals, and evenafter twentyfiveminutes, you do not believe that. When, inMelville, in twentyseconds, it's clear. Thefirstscene between-MichelConstantin et -Ventura is a great example of that. Omitted.

13.   Meurisse was a veryintelligent actor. Sometimes he overacts. Because he was intelligent, he tried to show toomuch he is moreintelligent than his material, and he has a sarcastic way of delivering the line, but Melville knew how to restrain him, to use that intelligence, the ability to give kind of cynical, sarcastic lines. The film has manymanyparts that are veryverywell cast. Veryverywellcast. And great sense of atmosphère. I think the scene where Gu is trapped by the police, byJeanClaudeBercq is absolutelyterrific. The landscape there give[s] a kind of desolate feelings to the shot. Omitted.

14.   The film was veryveryverywellreceived. There was even a superb article byGillesJacob, who was not, at the time, the president ofCannesFF. He was writing inCinéma, sixtyfive, sixtysix, I mean, the year of the film. The big, big, big. He says, Among the french crimefilms in the last year, we had threemasterpieces. ClasseTousRisques, TroueLe, and now, DeuxièmeSouffleLe. Three great films, and I do not see. Yet, I do not see any link between them. When I read the article, I said, This is bizarre. So, I showed this article toJoséGiovanni, and he sent a letter. He said, Don't you think there is at least onelink? Those threefilms are based on my books. Laughter ofTavernier. I wrote the screenplays of all those films, and this is my dialogue in the threefilms. Laughter ofTavernier. So at least, it creates a link between the threefilms. Omitted.

15.   Giovanni, by the fact that he spent manymanyyears in jail. Tenyears waiting to be [executed] killed, [guillotioned], met those people. He knew the world ofDeuxièmeSouffleLe, but Melville wanted to assign adaptation, screenplayadaptationanddialogue, and Giovanni fought against that. Becuase, he showed that ninetyeightpercent of the dialogue was coming out of the book. The dialogue was Giovanni, and the story was Giovanni. At the end, there was a settlement, which says adaptation byJeanPierreMelville and screenplayanddialogue byJoséGiovanni. And Melville, that originated [hatred] ofMelville forGiovanni. And Giovanni was ratherfair to say that he did notlikeMelville as a man, but he said that the film was veryverywelldirected. Giovanni, as a man and as an artist, was preferring Becker et ClaudeSautet, but he respected the skill ofMelville. So onesubject which was important toGiovanni, and that's grande ** deMelville, that’s is friendship, loyalty, and that's something which is verymoving. The theme, in a way, Giovanni was covering territory already been exploredbrilliantly byJacquesBecker inTouchezPasAuGrisbi[1954], I mean, about aging gangsters, people starting to be disconnected in new world. So, this is something that Giovanni was verysensitive, and, in his way, Melville, too. Melville was feeling a little likeVentura, displaced director, a director out of tune withNewWave. In a way, Ventura, to feel the impression that he is alone, that it's moreandmoredifficult for him to go out, you feel a little bit of despair. Melville, he should have gone deeper into this, but Melville was alsofeeling that it could hurt the film commercially if you are going tooextreme. He tried to do it in themostelegant way possible. Melville was interested in that, being elegant. He was interested in disperse should not showoff, should be read in the subtext, and not advertised. Omitted.

16.   I think he invented the kind of film which are reflection, which are exploring, also the films of memories he has those films, and how those films tried to call in him. Playing with archetypes, those films, I will not say philosophical, but there are like soulful, greek examination of the genre. Like a jazzmusician would take a standard byGershwin, and redo it in his own way. He's takingThisGunForHire[1942] and combine it with maybe one or two other films, and he makes his own version, but in such a way he’s taken different kind of chords, playing with different kind of harmonies, yet you have the melody. Omitted.

17.   I think Melville put the genre to kind of perfection. The probl?me was it was soperfect, it was imitated by many director. But I wonder we are not losing something in it. And I think Melville felt it, because we went toArmeeDesOmbresLe[1969], in which, I think is another masterpiece. DeuxiemeSouffleLe killed a certain category of crimefilms.