Dominique Blanc

Interview by Rada Djurica

Dominique Blanc, the most appreciated and most critically-acclaimed French actresses of today, won four Cesar Awards (and was nominated for Best Actress in 2000 in "Stand By" and three times for Best Actress in a Supporting Role: in 1990 with "Milou en mai", and in 1992 with the grand cinema spectacle "Indochine." In 1998, four "Ceux qui m'aiment prendront le train," she was nominated for awards four more times. In September 2008, Blanc won the Volpi Cup for Best Actress at the 65th Venice Film Festival.

Dominique's shadowy but strikingly feminine figure seems to represent all of France today. She walked into the press conference silently and with dignity. She reminded us of a French perfume fragrance — the top of the top.

At International Film Festival FEST09 in Belgrade in Serbia, Dominique Blanc presented two films, "L'Autre" (The Other One), where Blanc magnificently interprets Anne-Marie, a brave and loveable woman of mature age. The other film, "Plus tard, tu comprendras" (One Day You'll Understand) a film directed by the world's most graceful and effective filmmaker, Amos Gitai, was about the Klaus Barbie trials, with Blanc playing opposite Jeanne Moreau.

The festival also presented a magnificent stage performance of Blanc in Marguerite Duras' "The Pain." The play was done in cooperation with Thierry Thieu Niang, directed by great Patrice Chereau, a well known French film director who has created this monodrama especially for his muse, Dominique Blanc. Here she interprets one of the most touching text of post-war literature, the diary of Marqurite Duras, dedicated to her waiting for her husband Robert to come back from the Nazi concentration camp. In this wonderful classic piece Dominique's bare silence and acts of unbelievable simplicity and intensity, portray Duras' pain and her desperate anticipation. Her performance provides an accurate picture of Duras as she wanders through the city, running from office to office, cursing the phone that doesn't ring. All the while, the audience hears her secret cries and glimpses the occasional ray of hope for her husband to come back home alive.

What do the awards mean to you?

The awards are very precious to me. Especially when I get back in time and I remember when I started to do acting and I had some misfortune. I was rejected, so when you get some awards, that makes you feel encouraged, and you get self-esteem about what you do for some time.

Anne-Marie in L'Autre (The Other One) is a very complex part. It asks many questions. It's about a woman who leaves a much younger man and finds herself madly jealous of his new girlfriend. Here I recognize fear, something like obsession, a love. How did you fell about Anne-Marie? Are you defending her or judging her?

I defend Anne-Marie, and I love Anne-Marie. I'm always in love with characters that I play, because it is necessary to be their advocate on film. Anne-Marie is one free woman, a social worker that likes freedom and wants to start a new life. At the end she gets jealous, which is a variation of desire. She is one whole woman that slowly falls into the madness. In this film, the entire process of how it is happening is very well shown.

Tell us about the attitude for women you play?

My attitude as an actress is that I defend all my characters. I'm their advocate on film, and I want in all occasions to give myself to them without judging.

The second film of this festival is Plus tard, tu comprendras (One Day You'll Understand), based on the novel by Jerome Clermont. Did you have the chance to read the novel before Amos engaged you for the film?

I'd read the book and film [screenplay], and what Jerome and Amos offered here is to play Clermont's sister. I asked them to meet her so that I could play her character the best. Katrina Clermont is not well known in film, but she is a very well-known journalist: a writer that spent some time in India, a fascinating character. She agreed for me to play her, and that was enough for me.

You did Marguerite Duras's The Pain in the theatre. It is a very difficult subject, directed by Patrice Chereau. Tell us something about the show and how do you find yourself in Duras' text. What is your attitude toward Duras' work?

I worked in theatre with Patrice for a very long time. We agreed to work together again. This was the first text he suggested to me. And after the first reading, I really liked it. I played Marguerite Duras in wait for her lover to return from Dachau, the concentration camp in April 1945. At the end, she saves his life, which is total redemption. It is a tragic story of April 1945, a woman that waits for her man to come back from camp; she is ready to die in waiting. It is about 45 days of waiting here.

Those two films and a theatre play are very intimate, yet the audience knows you from the films Indochine and Queen Margot, which are spectacles. Can you compare those two kinds of films: the spectacles of the '90s and now, in the 21st century, the more intimate films?

Intimate films were always popular in France, and I would say that these kinds of films are more often to invest, then a history spectacles. I do not know any other projects at the moment that resembles a Queen Margot in France. There are lots of comedies to be shot today, because the times are like that: that people need comedy to cheer up.

What do you prefer: theatre or film?

I'm happy because I do not need to choose between theatre and film. When I started in the theatre with Patrice Chereau I never thought I would do films, as well. And I really like the best when I do films and theatre equally, in one year.

Belgrade International Film Festival