Ponette, the eponymous heroine of Jacques Doillon's latest feature, is four years old when her mother dies in an accident.
For Ponette, this absence is intolerable. She talks to her mother, calling for her, unable to believe that she is no longer there. Nobody, it seems, will ever be able to convince her to stop looking.
Ponette's refusal to accept adult reality, her struggle against her surroundings and her refusal to be comforted form the inspiration for Doillon's film, which offers a new variation on a theme familiar from his previous work: the innocence of children contrasted with the 'reality' of adult existence.
Since Doillon's directorial debut in 1972 with L'an 01, he has carved out a niche for himself with his intelligent, if sometimes rather idiosyncratic films. For this, his latest feature, he adapted the process of filmmaking to suit the perspective of its central character.
"Jacques' request sounded simple," says director of photography Caroline Champetier. "It was to make the film at the level of a four-year-old child. I have a four year old myself and thought I knew what it meant, but this request was not as easy as I thought. We had to become small in both a real and a psychological, imaginary sense."
Such an approach posed Champetier a number of logistical problems. "The camera is always in movement, as the script demands, but it was heavy. We used a dolly on 50 metres of rails, together with a swan-neck to bring the camera very low.
I set the eyeline at about 80cm, just below [actress] Victoire's face."
Doillon's insistence on this very real 'shrinking' (partly reminiscent of Ozu, who traditionally shot from a similarly low position) took its toll on Champetier - she had to wear a corset for her back, while she was eventually able to recognize her adult colleagues from their knees.
And while the philosophy was to be simple, that did not mean that the level of equipment was basic. "For example, I didn't want to use heavy equipment which might frighten the children. But Jacques and [producer] Alain Sarde wanted to film in 35mm and also wanted to use a big zoom for flexibility. And by the end of the shoot the volume of equipment had trebled, partly because the weather in Le Ventoux, where the film was shot, was very cold."
Indeed, Doillon's desire to reflect the simplicity of a child's vision made sophisticated demands on all the technical crew. Sound recordist Jean-Claude Lareux was faced with the problem of Doillon constantly talking to the young actors during filming. By using six-track recording constantly, and re-balancing the sound levels in the edit, Lareux was able to keep the authentic dialogue.
The striking thing about Doillon's approach was that the children were required to stick to the director's script, despite the fact that none of them could actually read it! By a method of repetition they were able to learn the lines, with a result that impressed an initially sceptical Lareux. "I had thought a film with four year olds was impossible, but I quickly believed it was feasible. It didn't sound like actors repeating lines - it sounded so spontaneous.
Jacques found a way of communicating that he had never used in his other films; it was something mysterious."
There was little or no improvisation on set, or departure from the script, with some apparently simple scenes having to be reshot 15 or 20 times. But Doillon's innovative methods and attention to detail are well-known, not least to his colleagues.
In order to understand a four-year-old's viewpoint, Doillon ignored W. C. Fields' well-known maxim and spent months working with children, to try and convey the impression that the film was written from their viewpoint. A difficult task, perhaps, but as the director puts it, "a film without risk is not wise." The significance of the age, however, is that children don't start to rationalise in an 'adult' way until the age of five. Before that shift, however, lies a worldview which clearly fascinates Doillon.
Amid the pressure of adult reality being imposed on you, the director seems to be saying, "Do not give up on your desires." Nick Thomas
Prod co: Les Films Alain Sarde, Rhone-Alpes Cinema, with the participation of CNC and Canal+
Prod: Alain Sarde
Dir/scr: Jacques Doillon
Ph: Caroline Champetier
Sound: Jean-Claude Lareux, Dominique Hennequin
Ed: Jacques Lecompte
Mus: Philippe Sarde
Cast: Victoire Thivisol, Delphine Schiltz, Mathiaz Bureau Caton, Léopold Serre, Marie Trintignant, Xavier Beauvois, Claire Nebout, Aurelie Verillon
Running time: 107 mins
Int sales: Le Studio Canal+
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