All language subtitles for Lettre eng

Letter to Freddy Buache

regarding a short film

on the city of Lausanne

-- Dear Freddy,

I'll try to talk to you about

this short film on
the city of Lausanne.

I'll try talking in
order to guide you.

I think they'll be furious.

They gave money
for a film on

and this is a film about.

It hasn't yet reached
the surface.

It's still at the
bottom of things.

You and I are too old

and cinema will die
soon, very young,

without giving everything
it could.

We must get quickly to
the bottom of things.

It's an emergency.

The police often stopped us when
we were shooting.

The other day, we were
stopped on the highway.

He said we could only stop
here for emergencies.

We said it was an emergency.

The light wouldn't
last for long.

He didn't care. It was
against law and order.

I've always passed through
from Vevey to Geneva

and from Geneva to Vevey,
from east to west.

I'd go up, then
come down again,

because it's a city
that rises and falls.

They say we were dishonest

and didn't fill their order,

but it's not very honest to
make an order like that.

We'd need five years' worth of
light to make a film like that.

I'd like to get to
the center of energy.

In this city, I thought
there was something

between the sky and the water.

While shooting, I saw something
between green and blue.

Do you remember when
Wittgenstein said

we'd made a mistake
and called blue green.

That's perfect for Lausanne,
changing meanings.

After a lot of research,

I realized that three shots
were enough:

a green shot, a blue shot

and the way it descends
from green to blue.

Or the way it rises back up.

Between the two is gray.

There are curves and forms,

but no straight lines.

It starts when there
are no straight lines.

The city has become
straight lines.

Crisscrossing straight lines.

You lose your life crossing it,

but losing can be a pleasure.

The residents of this
city win by losing,

and you can see it
better than anywhere.

So I thought of three shots,
which is hard to do.

Bonnard managed it at
the end of this life.

Picasso managed it
at the beginning.

All I need is three shots.

What do you think about
a shot like this?

A shot that starts in the dark,

there there's light, then we see
that it's green.

Then there's what we'll
call an upper shot.

Then a middle shot, square
and made of stone.

Then a lower shot.

At the bottom, we'll
find another color.

Forms and colors.

They say we're dishonest
and haven't filled the order.

I disagree, because why did
they order this film?

To celebrate the 500th
anniversary

of Lausanne's founding.

There was a lower Lausanne
near the water,

and an upper Lausanne, near the
sky and the mountains.

The two came together
to form the center.

The periphery was lost.

It was thrown body and
soul into the center.

The three shots have to
last long enough

to see the movement
of green and blue

as it passes through gray,

solid as rock, as if it
would replace eternity.

Then it returns.

I liked this passage.

We're trying to escape
the spirit of geometry

and the stones of city planners.

We end up on the rocks,

where we can put our
feet in the water.

Reminds me of Baudelaire.

It's very clear.
I don't see how

I haven't done what
I was supposed to do.

There was something interesting
in this short film.

Remember that quote by Lubitsch?

If you knew how
to film mountains,

film water and green, you'd know
how to film people.

I totally agree. It interested
both Yves and me,

each in his own way.

To get out of documentary,

of the place where
we live or lived,

and try to examine it
scientifically.

Think of Voyager on Saturn.
It took two pictures,

and scientists have four years
of work from them.

I want to try looking at
things scientifically.

try to find in these
crowd movements

the beginnings of fiction,

because cities are fiction.

Green, the sky and
the forest are novels,

water is a novel,
the city is fiction.

Fiction is a necessity

which can make the city
beautiful.

The people who live there are
often wonderfully moving.

Even in a very rich country
like this one.