But what a marvel! Blind willows, sleeping woman by Pierre Földes is one of the most beautiful and atypical works of the Annecy Festival 2022 where the film was rewarded. The director has tackled a sizeable challenge: bringing to the screen an anthology of news by Haruki Murakami. The success is brilliant when he shares the adventures at the borders of the Fantastic with lost Japanese people, after the tsunami and the earthquake which devastated the country in 2011.
“I went to Japan to do research there, but I never met Murakami-san,” the director told 20 minutes. I don’t even know if he has seen my film, which I admit is a little frustrating. The lack of support from the author did not prevent the director from transcribing his dreamlike universe with as much sensitivity as talent.
The technique of “Live Animation”
An employee dumped by a woman, his wife feeling bad about herself, a lost cat but above all an aging “salary man” and a huge frog called “Frog” are the heroes of this deliberately disconcerting feature film which bewitches with its beauty. Pierre Földes left nothing to chance.
The filmmaker began by drawing his film with one sketch per shot. He then posed these drawings in transparency in front of the viewfinder of the camera before placing real actors and sets there. “This technique, which I call ‘Live animation’, served as a reference and to obtain frames close to my storyboard,” he explains. This complete author also composed the superb music for his film full of endearing characters.
A successful duo
The duo formed by a solitary commercial attaché and a talkative batrachian who wants to turn the tired man into a very discreet superhero is the film’s greatest success. Pierre Földes dubbed Frog himself both physically and vocally and thought of the Japanese actor Takashi Shimura (seen especially in Live by Akira Kurosawa) for the graphics of his human vis-à-vis. “Both under the two sides of the same coin, insists Pierre Földes. They touched me by their interaction which will change the life of a man who one would have thought finished. »
If Haruki Murakami is present in these stories between trivial and magical, it is also David Lynch that we think of in front of Blind willows, sleeping woman. It’s good to see such an original film in theaters.