Eminent French director Michel Gondry will present his latest film Mood Indigo (L’écume des jours) during the gala opening ceremony of the 48th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. This strikingly poetic fantasy story about the power and resolve to make any kind of sacrifice for a loved one stars Audrey Tautou and Romain Duris. The adaptation of Boris Vian´s cult novel was produced by STUDIOCANAL in association with Brio Films.
50-year-old native of Versailles Michel Gondry is one of the most original filmmakers on the current international scene. Like his contemporaries – Spike Jonze or David Fincher – he steers clear of the straightforward, mainstream route; he aims to present his audiences with a fresh view of the world, both in his formal approaches and, above all, since his heroes resist any form of integration; in consequence, their lives sometimes evolve into a crazy alternative to the traditional stereotype. And another aspect links Gondry with the colleagues mentioned above: like them, he gained professional film experience creating dozens of video clips and commercials, and it was via these “modest” compositions that he perfected his sense of compact narrative and his precision in handling all the various formal techniques. Gondry’s video clip portfolio features musicians from across the style spectrum – from Björk, Paul McCartney and Sheryl Crow, to Radiohead and Lenny Kravitz.
In 2001 he caused a stir with his highly original feature film debut Human Nature. Three years down the line he rose to fame with the comedy Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, starring Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet. Favourable reviews and the commercial success of the film were then topped by an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay, awarded to the three co-scriptwriters: Gondry, Charlie Kaufman and Pierre Bismuth.
Gondry’s persistent, roguish take on reality, and its transformation into stories which won’t appeal to those without an imaginative streak, were also reflected in the film The Science of Sleep (2006), also the comedy Be Kind Rewind (2008) and the crime action comedy The Green Hornet (2011). Despite its singularity and a certain exclusivity, the poetic imagery in Gondry’s films is undeniably intriguing, a fact attested to not only by the thousands of fans who follow his work, but also by his manifest ability to recruit well-known acting names on both sides of the Atlantic for the majority of his movies.
Gondry’s works have regularly featured on the Karlovy Vary programme, thus it is a great honour for the festival to be able to screen his latest title in the presence of the filmmaker himself.
