Competition: “Les Chansons d’Amour (Love Songs)” by Christophe Honoré

After having presented his previous films in Cannes – 17 Fois Cécile Cassard (Seventeen Times Cecile Cassard – 2002) in Un Certain Regard and Dans
Paris (Inside Paris – 2006) in the Directors’ Fortnight – French director Christophe Honoré is back on the Croisette, but this time in Competition, with a musical
comedy featuring Louis Garrel – who already appeared in Ma Mère (My Mother) and Dans Paris – along with Ludivine Sagnier, Chiara Mastroianni,
Clotilde Hesme and Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet. Les Chansons d’Amour focuses on the tribulations of a triangle love story composed of Ismaël, Julie and Alice. The musical
soundtrack bills thirteen original songs, performed by the actors and scored by Alex Beaupain.

Christophe Honoré, who wrote the film using songs Beaupain had already written, declared: “There was no question of me making a parody of the genre. I simply approached it by
saying: ‘This film is a musical because the characters can only express their feelings by singing.‘ The issue of the story was never raised in fact, only the idea of how to deal with
it without becoming petrified, how to tell it and make it work in a musical structure that reflects on the whole film. The settings, such as the parent’s apartment return like a chorus,
with a different tone according to what happened in the previous verse. And, as in a song where certain instruments return or vanish while others are added on, the secondary characters give fresh
impetus to the story while others are ejected from it.”

Photo Copyright AFP