“I discovered that I had hearing problems during a shoot,” says Pascal Elbé to 20 minutes. This is what gave him the idea to write and direct We are made for each other, a film discovered this summer at the Angoulême Festival in which he plays a teacher who must accept having lost part of his hearing.
His love affair with an irascible neighbor embodied by a volcanic Sandrine Kiberlain is tinged with tenderness when he sympathizes with the latter’s daughter, mutic since the death of her father. This comedy lifts the veil on an unknown subject. “The hearing problems that strike my character are often taboo, insists Pascal Elbé. The film aims to make this phenomenon better understood. “
In denial
The hero moves away from those around him who find him not very attentive and who take a long time to accept his problem. “This man is in denial because it is difficult to admit that one should be fitted with a fitting when one is still young,” admits Pascal Elbé. However, hearing aids are the best way to get back to normal life by reconnecting with the world. “
The beginnings are however difficult because the amplified sounds exhaust the man even when he hears a colleague eating crisps which makes him the effect of a tsunami in the ears. “We worked a lot on the soundtrack with sound engineer Sam Cohen, insists Pascal Elbé. The audience needed to understand what a hard of hearing person feels. The effect is explosive and laughter often finds its place in this well-conducted story which deserves to be given an eye – and of course an ear.