Robert Guédiguian

Biography: life and films

Robert Guédiguian is one of France's best-known and most widely respected auteur filmmakers. Proud of both his working class origins and the city in which he grew up, most of his films are concerned with the problems of ordinary working class people in his native Marseille. Whilst his films predominantly have a social realist bearing, Guédiguian is not overly preoccupied with naturalism. Often, he employs film noir thriller elements and stylistic touches which sometimes appear to be at variance with the ordinariness of his subject matter. The one theme that runs across Guédiguian's oeuvre is a growing sense of disillusionment with the ability of leftwing politics to improve the fortunes of the working classes. This pessimism is countered by a more hopeful assertion that the less privileged members of society can surmount their problems by working together. Guédiguian's cinema is therefore both a cry of despair, accepting that grand socialist dreams will always fail, but also an expression of hope, as friendship and solidaity will always see us through.

Robert Guédiguian was born on 3rd December 1953 in Marseille, a busy industrial seaport on the southeast coast of France. Both of his parents were immigrants - his mother was German, his father an Armenian dockworker. Guédiguian grew up in L'Estaque, a populous working class district of Marseille which would feature prominently in many of his films. He became interested in leftwing politics at an early age and for a while worked as a Communist activist. He studied sociology at university in Aix-en-Provence, where he met his future wife Ariane Ascaride, an aspiring actress who would later star in most of his films. Guédiguian's interest in cinema began when director René Féret invited him to work on an adaptation of Berlin Alexanderplatz. The project came to nothing but Guédiguian subsequently collaborated with Feret on his 1980 film Fernand, thus gaining his first screenwriting credit.

It was almost immediately after this that Guédiguian began directing his own films. His first feature, Dernier été (1981) was a collaborative effort with future producer Frank Le Wita. The lead characters in the film were played by Ariane Ascaride and Gérard Meylan, who would star in almost all of Guédiguian's subsequent films, forming a regular troupe with Jean-Pierre Darroussin. A distinctive blend of film noir crime drama and social realism, Dernier été paints a depressing portrait of how, in the face of unemployment and soulless urban development, working class people can be driven into a life of crime in order to survive. After Rouge midi (1985), an overly ambitious saga in which Guédiguian explores how migrant workers are assimilated into their host country, the director made two of his bleakest films: Ki lo sa? (1985), a sombre study in personal failure and disillusionment, and Dieu vomit les tièdes (1989), a film that laments the erosion of working class and political ideals.

L'Argent fait le bonheur (1993) and A la vie, à la mort! (1995) show a dramatic change in tone from Guédiguian's previous films, far lighter, more optimistic, although the darker undercurrents are still felt. Both film are a celebration of solidarity between friends and within the family unit and express the director's sincerely held view that most social ills can be cured not by politicians or political movements, but by individuals working together with common goals. Although by this stage he had made six films, Guédiguian was still a relatively unknown director, barely heard of outside France. It was his seventh film, Marius et Jeannette (1997), that was to make his name and earn him a worldwide following.

Marius et Jeannette is a classic love story, but one that is firmly anchored in the working class milieu. Set in the director's beloved L'Estaque district, against a backdrop of chronic unemployment and social fragmentation, the film is an uplifting romance, the sunniest and most likeable of Guédiguian's films. A critical and commercial success, Marius et Jeannette was awarded the coveted Prix Louis Delluc in 1997 and was nominated for seven Césars, including Best Director and Best Film, although it only won in one category, that of Best Actress (for Ariane Ascaride).

For his next film, Guédiguian returned to the darker themes of his early work, and this time the sunny location seems unfitting for a gritty portrait of people living on the margins. Told partly in flashback, À la place du coeur (1998) has the brooding film noir film texture of Guédiguian's first film and is strangely compelling, although it was not a success. This was followed by La Ville est tranquille (2000), which is arguably the director's darkest film. This is effectively an updated version of Jean Vigo's À propos de Nice (1930), and shows the dark underbelly that lies beneath sunny Marseille, a city riddled with all manner of socials ills - unemployment, racial tensions, prostitution, drug addiction, etc.

At this point, Robert Guédiguian chooses to move away from his social and political preoccupations and widens the scope of his cinema, presumably in an attempt to avoid being seen as too insular. À l'attaque! (2000) is a light-hearted send-up of the filmmaking process, in which the director indulges in a shameless spot of self-parody. Marie-Jo et ses deux amours (2002) is a fairly routine melodrama, but one that gives Ariane Ascaride one of her most demanding roles, as a woman who is hopelessly torn between two men. In Mon père est ingénieur (2004), Guédiguian develops a more lyrical and subjective approach, constructing a moving love story through the use of flashback. Le Promeneur du Champ de Mars (2005) is concerned with the last days of French President François Mitterand and is a sombre meditation on mortality and the limitations of political engagement.

Guédiguian has always been fascinated by his Armenian origins and in Voyage en Arménie (2006) he has the opportunity to explore his own roots. By mixing social realism, travel documentary and thriller elements, the director constructs a compelling drama that also serves as a beguiling portrait of a country about which the West is wilfully ignorant. This was followed by Lady Jane (2008), Guédiguian's first attempt at a classic French polar (mystery-thriller) which provides a powerful demonstration of the futility of revenge. Then came Guediguian's most ambitious film to date - L'Armée du crime (2009). This lavish wartime drama pays homage to a group of immigrants who worked for the Resistance during the Nazis' occupation of France in WWII. In Les Neiges du Kilimandjaro (2011), Guédiguian finally takes us back to L'Estaque and revisits many of his favourite themes, such as the importance of solidarity and forgiveness and the failure of socialism to improve the lot of the working classes.

The main appeal of Robert Guédiguian's cinema is its willingness to confront difficult social issues in a direct but unconventional manner, and always with charm and humanity. His films have a very distinctive poetry and have acquired a greater relevance as career policians prove themselves unable or unwilling to solve today's most pressing social problems. Long may he continue to stir our consciences.

Filmography

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