“Claude M le cinéma”, in première, a portrait of Claude Miller

In Claude M le cinéma (Claude Milller, cinéaste de l’intime), Emmanuel Barnault draws the portrait of the filmmaker who died last April, at the age of 70. The author of 17 feature films, Claude Miller has left his mark on several generations of cinephiles, thanks to films such as The Best Way to Run, Garde à vue, Charlotte and Lulu, Class Trip and A Secret.

On the eve of the screening of Claude Miller’s last film, Thérèse Desqueyroux, to close the Official Selection, Cannes Classics presents the première of Claude M le cinéma, an exclusive documentary on Claude Miller, his films, his love of film, his influences, his initiation with Bresson, Demy, Godard and Truffaut.

Claude M le cinéma was made by Emmanuel Barnault, a director who had already devoted several documentaries to film personalities (Jean-Pierre Mocky, Michael Lonsdale, Bulle Ogier). “I was born in 1969, and I grew up with Claude Miller’s films. His work has always touched me, because he talks about himself, of intimate things, but he nevertheless speaks to everyone. I wanted to please this gentleman by devoting a film to him.” Mission accomplished, according to Emmanuel Barnault, as Claude Miller was “very happy” with the outcome that he was able to see last January.

The guiding thread of the film is a long interview, made in one sitting at the Miller family home in the Creuse, in November 2011, supported with extracts from films and archives created on set. Five people close to the filmmaker also give their testimonials: Annie Miller, his wife and producer since The Smile in 1994, Luc Béraud, screenwriter for his earliest films, Bertrand Blier, filmmaker and a very close friend, Jean-Louis Livi, Miller’s former agent who became a producer with The Little Thief in 1990, and Charlotte Gainsbourg, the revelation in Charlotte and Lulu, at the age of 13.

B. de M.

The film is screened in Salle Buñuel, Saturday, 26 May at 7:45 p.m.