Être et avoir (2002)
Directed by Nicolas Philibert

Film Review

An extraordinarily captivating portrait of a primary school teacher and his class of infants, Être et avoir is one of the most surprising French films to be released in 2002, and has proven to be an unexpected success.  It attracted over 1.5 million spectators in France (a record for a documentary film) and won the Prix Louis-Delluc in 2002, then a César in 2003 for the best edited film.

At a time when teaching has been devalued by social attitudes and marred by high-profile stories of child abuse, the film offers a much-needed positive view of the profession.  It will probably do more to raise the status of teaching and its attractiveness as a career in France than any amount of government-sponsored advertising.

The film's director, Nicolas Philibert, came to make the film after having made a number of other documentary films and his talent as a documentary film-maker is more than evident.   Être et avoir demonstrates how it is possible to make a documentary which is every bit as compelling and entertaining as a scripted film, whilst having that feeling of spontaneity and intimacy which a conventional film will always lack.   Philibert prefers to film life as it is with minimal intervention, and it is an approach which works perfectly in Être et avoir, perhaps his best work to date.   The only place in the film where Philibert intervenes noticeably is when he interviews the school teacher, Monsieur Lopez - one of the film's most poignant sequences.

Philibert took great care in choosing both the location of the school and the size of the class.   Although they are becoming less common, there are still many one-class schools in France, mainly in rural areas, which accommodate pupils of all ages from the same community in the same class.    Philibert spent ten weeks in the school he chose (St Etienne sur Usson in the Auvergne region) in six separate periods over the school year 2000-2001.  He had no preconception of which of the children would become the film's focus whilst filming - this emerged when he came to edit the kilometres of film he had accumulated.

Day-to-day experiences in the classroom and school playground are subtly interwoven with some achingly beautiful photography of the Auvergne countryside.  Whilst we are enchanted by the infants (particularly the delightful Jojo) and their relationship with their saintly schoolteacher, the film also has a melancholy side, equally moving.  The changing seasons remind us that life is a cycle of birth, growth and death, the same basic rule applying to fields of wheat as to human beings.

Magnificent in its simplicity and eloquence, Être et avoir manages to be both a heart-rendingly moving film on the one-hand and a hugely entertaining film on the other.  To say that this is just a documentary about schoolchildren and their teacher would do the film a great injustice.  There is so much more in the film about life in a wider context (for example, how people learn to interact with each other and their environment), making it relevant to everyone, of any age, culture or position in society.

Film Synopsis

In the Auvergne region of France, Monsieur Lopez is the sole teacher in a small primary school which caters for 12 pupils aged between four and ten.  As the seasons pass, from an inclement winter to a bucolic summer, Monsieur Lopez prepares his young pupils for life, as he himself approaches retirement.