Les baisers de secours

Philipe Garrel plays the role of Matthieu, a film-maker who is preparing to make a film. He decides to entrust the female lead to a well-known actress. In the assumption that the story of the film is ‘their story’, his wife Jeanne – who is also an actress – interprets this as a ‘betrayal of their love’. They separate. A long and sad period of loneliness and doubt follows for Matthieu.Les baisers de secours is about the family of a film-maker and is also played by the Garrel family. His father (Maurice Garrel, in reality also an actor), his wife (Brigitte Sy) and his little son (Louis Garrel) also play the father, wife and son of the film-maker in the film. The wife in the film wonders why she couldn’t play the role of the wife in the film; would it then maybe no longer be film?Les baisers de secours is an intimate and fragile film, made in an intense way and shot in clear and sombre black & white images, often close in to the actors. Colleague film-maker Léos Carax described it beautifully: ‘During the dawn or the dusk, in a secretive silence someone turns a handle without there being anyone to call “Action!” The air is cold. Through his mop of hair, the film-maker looks at his beloved wife. They shiver together. This shiver: cinema that shakes.’ And Louis Skorecki (Libération): ‘It is his story. It is also his most beautiful film.’