Nationale 7 belongs to a collection of telefilms called "Small Camera," shot for [French television station] Arte. This collection was a pro ject of Jacques Fansten, a producer from Telecip, who submitted it to Pierre Chevalier, from Arte. The idea was to ask directors from different horizons to make films with small DV cameras. The budgets were very small, an average of 4 million francs (around $510, 000), which is very low, even for a telefilm. We were free to choose any kind of subject and film it the way we wanted, provided it was with a small DV camera.

When I was asked to join in, I had no idea for a script. I managed to give a few to Jacques and Pierre, but they didn't get picked up. As a last resort, I said to Jacques: "Listen, I have this story which no one will ever want to see on film. My sister is a nurse at an institution for spastics near Toulon. I am familiar with spastics, I used to drive my sister's patients around Paris when they came to visit the capital. And the thing is, they always wanted to go round the Bois de Boulogne. I was in the van with them, and they would just gape at all these beautiful women and transvestites in complete wonderment. So, one day, I asked my sister: "Do handicapped people have a sexual life, do they have love stories?" And she told me: "Of course, they have! They're just like you and I!" And she started to tell me the story of this guy who, for the first time at the institution, had asked a nurse to take him to see a prostitute. He had told the nurse: "No ordinary woman will ever want to make love with me, only a prostitute might want to..."

So the nurse took her tape to measure the doors of the prostitutes' caravans scattered along the Nationale 7. Then she tried to persuade a prostitute to meet her patient... and the prostitute accepted. Not only René, but, little by little, many more handicapped persons. So she became a teacher for special needs in her own way! (laughs) When my story was over, Jacques told me: "Just go for it, this is well worth a Maupassant story!" So I wrote a script in three months with Anne Marie Matois, a literary editor turned producer. I wanted to shoot the film at my sister's institution, but it proved impossible when, only 15 days before the shooting, the director of the association got out of the project, fearing that the parents of handicapped persons belonging to the governing body would be shocked. The film was in great danger here, because among the 21 characters of the story, 18 were to be portrayed by professional actors, very sought-after ones, like Olivier Gourmet, from La Promesse and Rosetta (Palme d'Or Cannes 1999), and Nadia Caci. I had to find another solution. So I sent the script to the national association for handicapped persons, they read it in a week end and told me: "This story coincides with our present concerns. Just choose the institution where you want to shoot the film..." So eventually I shot this film at a home 40 kms away from Paris, much to the despair of the previous home's patients, who were willing to play in the film.

In fact, I drew on an old friend, named René Amistadi, who used to be a mineworker in Lorraine and died from myopathy at the age of 50. He helped me define the working class elements of my first script - I was a screenwriter for 15 years before making films. Although René was afflicted with myopathy, he carried on dating women, he lived with women until the end of his life. He was not a long-time home resident, as his disease started at a late age. We always wanted to write something about handicapped people, but he died 4 years before the idea for this film finally came about. I wanted to pay a tribute to him with this film, and to my sister as well... since it's also her story that I am telling in this film. But she doesn't like people to know that Julie's character is in fact herself (smiles).

Unfortunately no, they saw it on television. But I screened it at the the other one, where there were very mixed reactions! The handicapped loved the film, but people from the administration reacted rather badly to it. They thought it was a direct attack on them. The fact is that this story triggered a real discussion within the institution. Some people were in favour of it, others rejected it. Especially the men, who felt much more uncomfortable about taking handicapped persons to prostitutes than the women.

Maybe I chose a comic tone because I am of Italian origin and I love italian comedies of the 70s and 80s, like Pain au Chocolat and Nous nous sommes tant aimés. Also, I think that the more painful things are, the more necessary laughter becomes to tell others. Otherwise, I think nobody would dare go and see this film! (laughs) Moreover, I want to share laughter with the disabled. When you meet someone who is in a wheelchair, you never know how to address this person, you feel ill-at-ease... Well, there's no reason to behave like that! Handicapped people are normal people, they can be stupid, they can have faults, you can make fun of them, laugh with them. This is what I wanted. I think it's one of the most beautiful ways to show them respect. They are normal human beings, with faults and a sexuality.

I shot this film in 23 days with a small crew: a sound engineer, a cameraman, a trainee make-up girl and a trainee costumer. As I don't like to hold the camera myself, and I didn't feel very comfortable with the DV, I sought one of the best cameramen in France, Jean Paul Meurisse, who held the camera for Lars Von Trier on Breaking the Waves. One may like or not like this film, but the look of it and the camerawork are superb. So I sent him the script and he said to me: "That's a crazy story you have here, I'll go for it!" And he has since become my cameraman, we've just made another movie together.

I wanted the spectator to have the same kind of experience that I had. When you meet one handicapped person, it's OK. But when I first found myself at my sister's home facing 50 patients who trembled and dribbled eating, well I started to wonder: "Where on earth am I?" I pretended to have lunch with them, but I just couldn't. That was a very brutal experience for me. Then, one of them tried to tell me something. But however hard he tried, I just couldn't understand him. So I told it to my sister, and she told me: "Well, just tell him that you don't understand! Then, he will find a way to communicate with you." So I told the guy that I didn't understand him, and trying harder, he found a way to make me understand what he meant. From that moment on, I never looked at him the same way since I could communicate with him. And I very quickly forgot the wheelchair. In Nationale 7, the first part is rather "hard", and quite a lot of people have told me: "Jean Pierre, we don't understand what you want to show in the first 10 minutes, we just felt like leaving..."

Julie is a woman who has just begun working in the home, she doesn't have much experience, and she's been stuck with the sole patient no one's willing to care for, the big René, who, at the beginning, seems to be a real jerk. Julie is very naïve, but so is my sister. She is deeply naïve, but at the same time, when she makes up her mind about something, she goes all the way. I think you do need some resolve to talk a prostitute into making love with a handicapped person.

I think he's like a metaphor for man. He's stuck in a wheelchair, he's got his head full of love dreams but he can't act them out. Handicapped people fantasize a lot, you know, they watch porno films, they stick posters of naked women on the walls of their bedrooms, because all they're left thinking of is sex. By the way, I can tell you that for the very first time, at my sister's home, a handicapped girl was taken to visit a male prostitute... All this doesn't mean that handicapped persons have no love stor ies. One of the characters of the film, the one who says "Hello, René, good bye, René," has a wife and has just had a child with a handicapped woman, who hid her pregnancy from the administration so they wouldn't abort her. You know, for the film, I chose a home for people with mild disability. But if you actually saw the guy my sister took to see a prostitute, you would be amazed. He's skeleton-like, his legs are supported by splints...

I wouldn't have imagined such a character had he not existed! (laughs) My dear Rabah... (laughs)

I think people can recognize themselves in the film. We just forget the wheelchairs and we identify with René's character, with his yearning for love. I think that people can also relate to the gap that exists between fantasy and reality and which, is René's case, is materialized by a wheelchair. I think we all live with this gap. Also, it's difficult to talk about your sexuality, to live your sexuality, it's never easy; neither heterosexual nor homosexual relationships are easy. With René, these things of life are clear, simple, we can all relate to them. What really surprised me was that the San Sebastian audience reacted the same way as the Berlin one. People were really laughing and cheering. That was amazing. So I think there is something universal about this story. Something simply human...

Interview by Robin Gatto & Yannis Polinacci