André Téchiné

2.1. Early Life and Background

André Téchiné was born on March 13, 1943, in Valence-d'Agen, a small town located in the Tarn-et-Garonne department of the Midi-Pyrénées region in France. His family, which had Spanish ancestry, operated a small business specializing in agricultural equipment. He spent his formative years growing up in the rural southwest French countryside. From 1952 to 1959, he attended a Catholic boarding school in Montauban. During this period, he was permitted to leave the school only on Sunday afternoons, which he often used to visit the cinema, even if it meant returning before the film concluded. This early exposure to cinema became a crucial escape and a window to the world for the young Téchiné. In 1959, he transferred to a secular state school, which broadened his cultural horizons. This new environment introduced him to Marxist teachers, a film club, and a film magazine called La Plume et l'écran, to which he contributed. Téchiné has stated that films were his "only opening to the world" and his "only possibility of escaping [his] family environment and [his] boarding school," describing the experience as "magical."

2.2. Education and Early Influences

At the age of nineteen, Téchiné relocated to Paris with the ambition of pursuing a career in filmmaking. He attempted to gain admission to France's most prominent film school, the Institut des hautes études cinématographiques (IDHEC), but did not pass the entrance examination. Despite this setback, he began writing film reviews for the influential cinema magazine Cahiers du cinéma, where he worked for four years, from 1964 to 1967. His first article, published in July 1964, was a review of François Truffaut's film The Soft Skin. Téchiné's intellectual and artistic influences are diverse, drawing from figures such as Roland Barthes, Bertolt Brecht, Ingmar Bergman, and William Faulkner, alongside the cinematic principles of the French New Wave. His style is particularly influenced by his exploration of sexuality and national identity, often challenging conventional depictions of gay relationships, the North African dimensions of contemporary French culture, and the dynamic between Paris and his native Southwest. A personal detail of his life is his fear of flying, which prevents him from attending most film openings or festivals that are beyond a train ride from his Paris apartment, which overlooks the Luxembourg Garden.

2.3. Early Career and Criticism

Téchiné's initial foray into filmmaking emerged from a background in theater. He served as an assistant director for Marc'O on Les Idoles (1967), a film adaptation of an experimental play. This film was edited by Jean Eustache, and Téchiné himself made an uncredited walk-on appearance in Eustache's film La Maman et la putain (1972). He also worked as an assistant director for Jacques Rivette, who had been his editor at Cahiers du cinéma, on the film L'amour fou (1969). These early experiences in film criticism and as an assistant director provided him with a foundational understanding of cinematic craft and theory, preparing him for his eventual transition into directing. Téchiné has described his directorial process as fluid, stating, "I never know how each film will end. When I'm filming, I shoot each scene as if it were a short film. It's only when I edit that I worry about the narrative. My objective is to tell a story, but that's the final thing I do."

3.1. Debut and Early Films

André Téchiné made his directorial debut with Paulina s'en va (Paulina is Leaving) in 1969. The film centers on the titular character, who drifts aimlessly while struggling to overcome disenchantment and find her purpose in life. Initially conceived as a short film, it was shot in two distinct periods: one week in 1967 and two weeks in 1969. Despite being shown at the Venice Film Festival that year, it proved perplexing to audiences and was not officially released until 1975. During this interim period, Téchiné contributed screenplays for other directors, including one for Liliane de Kermadec's film Aloïse.

After gaining experience in television and theater, Téchiné achieved significant recognition with his second feature film, Souvenirs d'en France (French Provincial), released in 1974. This film is a unique blend of black comedy, romantic drama, and nostalgia, characterized by its distinct tone. Inspired by Orson Welles' The Magnificent Ambersons, the movie was filmed in Téchiné's native village. It presents a highly compressed history of a small-town family, spanning from the early 20th century through the French Resistance and up to the events of May 1968. In this work, Téchiné explored the intricate relationship between grand historical narratives and more intimate personal histories. The film notably stars Jeanne Moreau.

Téchiné further showcased his talent for creating atmospheric narratives with his subsequent film, the thriller Barocco (1976), a crime drama. The plot revolves around a boxer who, after accepting and then rejecting a substantial bribe from a politician to spread a lie that would influence an election, is murdered by a hired assassin. The boxer's girlfriend subsequently develops a romantic relationship with the killer, attempting to mold him into the image of her deceased lover. The film received critical praise for its elegant visual style.

Three years later, Téchiné ventured into biographical filmmaking with Les sœurs Brontë (The Bronte Sisters) in 1979, a profile of the renowned Brontë sisters. The film effectively conveys the heavy, repressive atmosphere and the harsh injustices that characterized the sisters' lives. It highlights the stark contrast between the vivid passion and color found in their novels and the gloomy reality of their daily existence, a contrast evoked by the film's somber cinematography. The film featured an ensemble cast, including Isabelle Adjani, Marie-France Pisier, and Isabelle Huppert as Emily, Charlotte, and Anne Brontë, respectively, with Pascal Greggory portraying their ill-fated brother, Branwell.

Hôtel des Amériques (1981), set in Biarritz, marked a significant shift in Téchiné's career. The film explores the strained relationship between a successful middle-aged woman and an unfulfilled, emotionally unstable man, depicting a story of hopelessly mismatched love. This work anchored Téchiné's filmmaking in a more realistic universe, moving away from the romanticism of his earlier works. For the first time, Téchiné allowed his actors to improvise, a practice he continued thereafter, adapting his scripts to incorporate new material. He noted that "From Hôtel des Amériques onwards my films are no longer genre films. My inspiration is no longer drawn from the cinema." This film also initiated a long and fruitful collaboration with actress Catherine Deneuve, who has praised Téchiné, alongside Truffaut, as "an exceptional gift to actresses."

3.2. Mid-Career and Critical Acclaim

After directing the television production La Matiouette ou l'arrière-pays (1983), André Téchiné returned to widespread critical attention with Rendez-vous (1985). This film is a noir melodrama, richly imbued with the seductive aesthetics of its era. The narrative follows Nina, an aspiring actress who flees her provincial home for Paris and becomes entangled in a turbulent love affair with a sadistic, self-destructive young actor responsible for his former girlfriend's death. When the actor dies in an accident, or possibly by suicide, his former mentor and the father of the deceased girlfriend decides to cast the inexperienced Nina as the female lead in 'Romeo and Juliet', a role his late daughter had played. By this point, Téchiné was widely recognized as a major director of the post-French New Wave movement. He was awarded the Cannes Film Festival's Best Director for Rendez-vous, a film that also helped launch the career of Juliette Binoche.

His next film, Le lieu du crime (Scene of the Crime) (1986), is set in the rustic surroundings of a small provincial town. The story centers on a young boy who assists an escaped criminal. The deeply troubled youth, affected by his parents' divorce, lives with his mother and grandparents while his father resides nearby. The escaped convict commits murder to protect the boy, subsequently becoming involved with the boy's mother. As the boy prepares for his first communion, his mother, feeling trapped in a mundane existence, falls in love with the convict and plans to flee with him.

In Les Innocents (1987), Téchiné explores complex relationships and societal tensions. A young woman from Northern France visits the Mediterranean city of Toulon for the first time, prompted by her sister's wedding and the disappearance of her deaf-mute brother, who supports himself as a pickpocket under the guidance of a young Arab and an older bisexual married man. The woman encounters these individuals and finds herself drawn to both the young Arab and the older man's bisexual son. She becomes romantically and sexually conflicted between the two, a dilemma that mirrors France's political unrest concerning its growing Arab population.

J'embrasse pas (I Don't Kiss) (1991) offers a bleak and melancholic portrayal of a young man's futile search for meaning in life. An idealistic 17-year-old leaves his rural home in southwest France, hoping to become an actor in Paris. After a promising start, he soon discovers he lacks acting talent, losing both his job and his accommodation. He ultimately resorts to male prostitution to survive. He falls in love with a young prostitute, but their relationship leads to tragic consequences for him.

My Favorite Season (Ma saison préférée) (1993) is a dark and somber narrative about estranged middle-aged siblings-a provincial lawyer sister and a surgeon brother. They begin to reconcile with their professional and personal lives as their aging mother declines following a stroke. Téchiné described Ma Saison Préférée as a film "about individuality and the coldness of the modern world." It received critical acclaim when it premiered in competition at the 1993 Cannes Film Festival.

The following year, Téchiné achieved his greatest success to date with Wild Reeds (Les roseaux sauvages) (1994). Commissioned by French television as part of an eight-film series titled Tous les garçons et les filles de leur âge, it was first released in cinemas. The film is a tale of teenage self-discovery, focusing on the inner turmoil of four teenagers at a boarding school in Aquitaine in 1962, set against the backdrop of their political and sexual awakening amidst the Algerian War. Téchiné explores themes such as family bonds, homosexuality, and exile. Wild Reeds is his most autobiographical film; like Téchiné in his youth, the main character, François, attends an all-male boarding school. While part of the story addresses François' discovery of his gay identity, Téchiné stated that his primary interest was to evoke how the Algerian War of Independence was experienced in a rural part of France. He explained, "If I hadn't been able to inject this, if I had only been making a film about adolescent coming of age, it wouldn't have interested me at all." Wild Reeds was a major success at the 1994 César Award ceremony, winning four of its eight nominations: Best Film, Best Director, Best Script, and Best Newcomer for Élodie Bouchez. It also received the Prix Delluc in 1994. This film was Téchiné's sixth released in the US (in 1995), and his most autobiographical at the time. Wild Reeds earned the New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Foreign Language Film and the National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Foreign Language Film.

Further critical acclaim came in 1996 with Les voleurs (Thieves) (1996), an ambitious and intricate crime drama. The film employs a non-linear narrative, jumping through time and shifting perspectives in a style reminiscent of Rashomon, to explore family and romantic connections. It portrays a fatalistic world where characters are bound by their origins and desires, seemingly trapped into becoming "thieves" in various senses-emotionally and existentially. This film garnered Téchiné nominations for the César Award and the Palme d'Or at Cannes, along with numerous other accolades.

3.3. Later Works

Following the success of Les voleurs, André Téchiné directed Alice et Martin (Alice and Martin) (1998), a poignant love story between two emotionally scarred outsiders. This film marked his reunion with Juliette Binoche. Similar to his earlier work Les voleurs, Téchiné presented the narrative out of sequence.

Loin (Far) (2001) was notable for being shot on digital video. Primarily utilizing natural light, the film employs a slightly degraded video image to evoke a sense of collapse and unease. Set in Tangier, the narrative unfolds in three distinct "movements," marked by chapters. The plot centers on three characters: a truck driver who transports goods between Morocco and France and is tempted to smuggle drugs across the strait to Spain; his young Arab friend, desperate to reach Europe; and the driver's Jewish ex-girlfriend, who is uncertain about her impending migration to Canada. Over the course of three days, these characters are forced to make fateful decisions.

After two less commercially successful ventures, André Téchiné received renewed acclaim with Strayed (Les égarés) (2003), an adaptation of the novel Le Garçon aux yeux gris by Gilles Perrault. While Téchiné typically weaves together multiple intersecting storylines, this wartime drama follows a single, linear narrative involving only four characters. Set in 1940, the story features an attractive widow fleeing Nazi-occupied Paris for the South with her young daughter and teenage son. They are soon joined by a mysterious young man, and the foursome find refuge from the war in an abandoned house.

Changing Times (Les temps qui changent) (2004) explores cultural clashes in contemporary Morocco. The film oscillates between two worlds and two perspectives on the meaning of experience and the enduring power of love. A middle-aged construction supervisor arrives in Tangier to search for a love interest from his youth, lost many years prior. She is now married with an adult son, and their paths eventually cross in a supermarket. Téchiné interweaves approximately half a dozen subplots, creating a series of variations on the theme of divided sensibilities that pull characters into states of perpetual unrest and potential happiness.

Les Témoins (The Witnesses) (2007) addresses the impact of the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s on a group of friends and lovers. The film's central characters include Mehdi, a French-Arab vice cop in an open marriage with Sarah, a children's book writer who struggles to bond with her newborn child. Sarah's best friend, Adrien, a middle-aged doctor, is infatuated with Manu, a narcissistic young man who has recently arrived in Paris from the South. The storyline also features Julie, Manu's opera singer sister, and Sandra, Manu's friend who works as a prostitute. The film is vibrant with color, life, and emotion until the AIDS epidemic dramatically disrupts the characters' lives. Les Témoins garnered widespread critical acclaim and brought Téchiné a level of international attention not seen since the success of his films Wild Reeds and Les Voleurs.

The Girl on the Train (La fille du RER) (2009) centers on a naive young woman who fabricates a story about being attacked on a suburban Paris train by black and Arab youths, claiming they mistook her for a Jew. The narrative is based on a real event that occurred in France in 2004. Téchiné dissects the psychological circumstances and consequences surrounding this significant lie in a rich drama. The director drew inspiration from Jean-Marie Besset's 2006 play RER, as well as from news reports and court records. Téchiné commented that "The story became the mirror of all French fears, a revelation of what we call the 'collective unconscious.' How an individual's lie is transformed into truth with respect to the community at large and its fears. It's a truly fascinating subject."

Set in Venice and adapted from a Philippe Djian's novel, Impardonnables (Unforgivable) (2011) follows Francis, an aging, successful crime novelist married to a much younger former model. While struggling with writer's block, he hires his wife's former lesbian lover to investigate the disappearance of his adult daughter from a previous marriage, who had eloped while visiting Venice. As his marriage begins to deteriorate, Francis pays the detective's troubled son to secretly monitor his wife's daily activities.

Like The Girl on the Train, In the Name of My Daughter (L'Homme que l'on aimait trop) (2014) is a fictionalized account of true events. This film depicts the events before and after the disappearance of casino heiress Agnès Le Roux in 1977. The plot intertwines themes of amour fou, mafia conflicts, a dysfunctional mother-daughter relationship, and courtroom drama. The world of the French Riviera's casinos and the mafia wars of the 1970s provide the backdrop for this retelling of a case that captivated France. The film, based on the memoir Une femme face à la Mafia written by Agnès Le Roux's mother and brother, marked the seventh collaboration between André Téchiné and Catherine Deneuve.

Téchiné continued his prolific output with films such as Being 17 (2016), which was nominated for the Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival, Golden Years (2017), Farewell to the Night (2019), Soul Mates (2023), and My New Friends (2024), which had its world premiere at the 74th Berlin International Film Festival.

3.4. Film Style and Thematic Concerns

André Téchiné's signature directorial style is characterized by its elegance and profound emotional depth. He is renowned for his sensitive yet unsentimental examination of human relationships and the complexities of the human condition. His films often delve into a wide array of recurring themes that reflect moral dilemmas and the evolving landscape of modern society. These include homosexuality, divorce, adultery, family breakdown, prostitution, crime, drug addiction, and AIDS. Téchiné's work consistently explores sexuality and national identity, often challenging conventional depictions of gay relationships and integrating the North African dimensions of contemporary French culture. He also frequently examines the dynamic between the cultural center of Paris and the periphery, particularly his native Southwest France. His approach to storytelling is often fluid; he has stated that he never knows how a film will end during shooting, focusing on each scene as a short film and only concerning himself with the overarching narrative during the editing process.

3.5. Key Collaborations

Throughout his career, André Téchiné has forged significant professional relationships that have greatly contributed to his cinematic vision. His most notable collaboration has been with actress Catherine Deneuve, with whom he has worked on seven films, including Hôtel des Amériques and In the Name of My Daughter. Deneuve has praised directors like Téchiné and Truffaut as "an exceptional gift to actresses." Téchiné also played a pivotal role in launching the career of Juliette Binoche with Rendez-vous, and they later reunited for Alice et Martin. Other prominent French actresses who have frequently appeared in his films include Isabelle Adjani, Isabelle Huppert, Sandrine Bonnaire, Emmanuelle Béart, Élodie Bouchez, Carole Bouquet, and Adèle Haenel.

5.1. Critical Reception and Awards

Téchiné's films have consistently received strong critical reception throughout his career. His work is often praised for its elegant style, emotional depth, and insightful exploration of complex human relationships and societal issues. He has been honored with several prestigious awards:

• Cannes Film Festival**: He won the Best Director for Rendez-vous in 1985.
• César Awards**:
  • Barocco (1976) received awards for Best Cinematography, Best Music Written for a Film, and Best Supporting Actress (Marie-France Pisier).
  • The Innocents (1987) won Best Supporting Actor (Jean-Claude Brialy).
  • I Don't Kiss (1991) earned Most Promising Actor (Manuel Blanc) and a nomination for Best Director.
  • My Favorite Season (1993) was an original script.
  • Wild Reeds (1994) was a major success, winning Best Film, Best Director, Best Writing, and Most Promising Actress (Élodie Bouchez). It was also an original script.
  • The Witnesses (2007) received Best Supporting Actor (Sami Bouajila) and a nomination for Best Director.
• Prix Delluc**: Awarded for Wild Reeds in 1994.
• International Critics Awards for Best Foreign Language Film**:
  • My Favorite Season (1993) won the Boston Society of Film Critics Awards for Best Foreign Language Film.
  • Wild Reeds (1994) won the Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best Foreign Language Film, the National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Foreign Language Film, and the New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
• Berlin International Film Festival**: Being 17 (2016) was nominated for the Golden Bear.

5.2. Influence on French Cinema

André Téchiné is regarded as one of the most significant and accomplished French film directors to emerge after the French New Wave. His work has profoundly influenced subsequent generations of French filmmakers through his distinctive style, characterized by psychological depth, emotional nuance, and a willingness to tackle complex social issues. He is noted for his ability to blend realism with melodrama, creating narratives that are both intimate and expansive. His exploration of themes such as sexuality, identity, and the impact of historical events on individual lives has contributed to a more diverse and nuanced representation of French society on screen. Téchiné's consistent output and critical success have ensured his enduring place within the landscape of contemporary French cinema, serving as a benchmark for artistic integrity and thematic ambition.

6.1. Scriptwriter only

• Transatlantic (1996) - Transatlantique
• Beach Cafe (2001) - Café de la plage