Jour des crêpes - Film de Alex Verhaest
Jour des crêpes
De Alex Verhaest, film 2018, 32min
Maria was forty in 1995 when in belgium, in the midst of the Dutroux-crisis, the white marche forced the primacy of churchly influence to sing its swan song.
Last born into a poor and pious family of eleven children, she had succeeded in a tour-de-force which would take her seven sisters two generations; she had definitively distinguished herself from her inherited role as the housewife under the crusifix.
Her favourite sister took up this role for her family. As less than an equal but more than a servant Benedicte sees to providing Maria’s daughter Madeleine with a cleanly and steady rhythm in step with the desanctified Church bells. A rhythm mocked by her own son, Dominik who is convinced different times are coming.
Both women identify with the things they feel are lacking in their life. Their emancipation, or lack thereof, has proven to be one of communicating vessels, with an emptiness as the result of plentitude.
Jour des crêpes is about the relationship between these two sisters. They symbolise the generation of nervous mothers of Flanders nineties.
First of all, my thanks go to Béla Tarr. His attentiveness and his advice enabled me to develop a new gaze. I warmly thank Melissa Dhont for her strong support in the making of Jour des crêpes. I also thank Hélène Devos, Marijke Pinoy, Els Deceuckelier and César De Sutter, whose contributions to the film went beyond anything I could have imagined. I thank all my technical team, notably Korneel Moeyaert who enchanted us with his light. I also thank all the personnel at Le Fresnoy for their expertise, their belief and their patience, and Early Birds Films. Finally, I wish to thank my father and my mother-in-law who helped me so deeply this year.
Oeuvres d'Alex Verhaest produites par Le Fresnoy :
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