WATCH WHAT YOU SAY
Dis pas de bêtises (Watch What You Say): a son pays homage to his dad, Pierre-William Glenn
An open and honest love letter from a son to his father, Dis pas de bêtises (Watch What You Say) shows Vincent Glenn rebuilding his relationship with his dad, renowned New Wave cinematographer Pierre-William Glenn. In this heartfelt documentary, featured as part of this year’s Cannes Classics, we are given a portrait of a man traversing horizons in the setting sun of his life.
How did the idea take shape around making a film with him, not about him, as you put it?
There were so many influences and motivations. On the one hand, we’d never taken a trip together, we’d never gone away just him and me. On the other hand, I’d been making movies for 30 years, and he’d had a full career with more than 80 feature films to his name. He worked with Alain Corneau on 1979’s Série noire, with Bertrand Tavernier on 1981’s Coup de torchon (Clean Slate), he did the lighting for Truffaut’s films, framed shots for Losey’s… And yet we’d only rarely worked together. The idea wasn’t so much to make a film about his career — I’d imagine others would be really good at making one —, so much as it was to make a film together, where our respective skills would complement each other.
How well did he play along?
He accepted the role of being an actor in his film, being in front of the camera while his mind’s eye was still able to see things through the camera lens. I really liked the idea of him being the main subject of the film. We followed the flow of film writing and documentary writing as it evolved, leaving the door open to writing out and outlining the scenes. It’s a very organic film, made in tune with his energy. The idea was, really, to create a film together. For once, he was in front of the camera, with me behind it. What story was there that we could tell together?
It’s a bonding film: was that a pleasant surprise for you?
Yes. The reality was: the film spoke about us. When he talks about his relationship with his father, he’s talking about us, too… There was this distance between us that, even today, I want to cover up, shy away from. There’d been real clashes: he fed a sort of sense of resentment, in that, while he was celebrated as an amazing cinematographer, he didn’t get the recognition he wanted as a director. I, on the other hand, devoted myself straightaway to making documentaries. A lot of things went unsaid around this. Ours was not an easy father-son relationship: there was a certain toughness about him, something that came from the life he led, from a sort of withdrawing. I show hints of this in the film, but for the most part, it remains just under the surface.
In what ways did this film help you two reconcile with each other?
It was way for me to discover how to communicate again after so many years of silence. Cinema acted as a facilitator, allowing us to find ourselves again by listening to what it was telling us, by creating something out of the material. When we were filming, he was very weak, following his stroke, so there was this urge to want to lift his spirits. That’s the role I play throughout the film. If there’s one message, that’s it: it’s never too late to find a way to show affection again, a way to show a love that speaks for itself.
