Festivals - Gerardmer 2021 : Anonymous Animals will be screened

By Mulder, 21 january 2021

"Les Animaux Anonymes draws its origin from an obsessive image: that of a horse attacking man under carnivorous impulses. This nightmarish unconscious image came to nourish other very real ones, stemming from a rural childhood. Because of my proximity to a natural environment, I was the privileged observer of a wild nature, but also the witness of a fatal hold of man on the animal through exploitation and hunting. These paintings, sometimes bloody, macabre, cruel, came to feed over time a strong empathy towards the animal and a constant questioning as to its place in our society. This carnivorous horse which haunted me, answered for a dysfunction, a sick and dying nature. This digression of the food chain was then transformed during the writing of the film, into a transposition of the bodies between man and animal. The resulting anthropomorphic animals act according to our codes of dominants, farmers, hunters, carrying within them a dehumanization towards the human species... human. This crossing of the mirror thus places the human protagonists under the yoke of animal domination, for whom they are nameless silhouettes, anonymous animals, drowned under volumes of exploitation where each is interchangeable with the other".

Animals Anonymous takes place at animal level. By adopting a point of view that responds to primitive instincts, the intention was to depict a state of anxiety and apprehension in the face of human action that could conceal within it as many enigmas as threatening behaviors. In the face of the unknown from which dark designs hover, the question of suspense arises naturally.

This first feature film follows in the footsteps of a cycle of wordless films (And The Winner Is, Les Éphémères Fugitifs, Altera), which were already based on body language: gesture taking precedence over words, movement over dialogue. For Les Animaux Anonymes, the first sketches of dialogues quickly appeared to be superfluous and futile. Placed in an environment they did not master, the protagonists' senses were constantly on alert and the slightest movement expressed an intention. The purity of the dialogues has thus rehabilitated silence, silence has given way to something organic and universal. This sensitive approach has joined the idea of the communication barrier between man and animal. By inverting the places of each, I wanted to keep this inability to decipher the language of these anonymous animals to preserve a purely physical exchange.

The environment of the anonymous animals is based on a decaying nature, a breathless world where the land seems sterile. The agricultural heritage of the Allier and Nièvre regions, combined with natural autumn light, have brought to life the universe of a film that evokes a rural world in decay, paralyzed by an omnipresent fog heralding the end of a cycle. Between the first part of shooting and the second, a year will pass before the diffuse autumn luminosity that gives the film its funeral atmosphere. While the anonymous animals were shot over six days, the sound post-production was spread over more than thirty days to give life to the anthropomorphic animals. In a realistic approach, every breath, every step, every gesture of these animal protagonists was noisy in order to give them presence and thickness.

In parallel to commissioned films (clips and commercials), Baptiste Rouveure continues his work in fiction where movement and body language remain his preferred approach. In 2012, his short film, And The Winner Is, portrays a boxer fighting his double. Among the international selections, the film received the "Best short film" award at the 35th Rassegna Cinematographica Internazionale Festival in Italy. In 2018 Altera will bring together 13 dancers in a dystopian world to deal with the rejection of others and the resulting withdrawal into oneself. The film stands out with 30 selections in official competition in more than 20 countries. It has twice won the prize for best dance film (Imajitari International Dance Film, Moving Body Festival), the prize for best editing (Muestra Movimiento Audiovisual) and the prize for best photography (Festival de Cinearte en la Frontera). Les Animaux Anonymes is Baptiste Rouveure's first feature film. The film, without words, at the crossroads of fantasy and suspense, questions the place of animals in our societies.

Parallel to the making of music videos and commercials, Baptiste Rouveure pursues a work of fiction in which movement and body language are an integral part of his approach. Thus, in 2012, his short film And the Winner Is portrays a boxer fighting his double. In 2018, his fourth short, Altera, brings thirteen dancers together in a dystopian world to deal with the rejection of the other and the resulting withdrawal into oneself. Les Animaux anonymes is her first feature film.

Synopsis :
The balance of power between man and animal has changed. In a remote countryside, any encounter with the dominant can become hostile...

Anonymous Animals
Written and directed by Baptiste Rouveure
Starring Thierry Marcos, Aurélien Chilarski, Pauline Guilpain, Emilien Lavaut
Music by Damien Maurel
Cinematography : Emmanuel Dauchy, Kevin Brunet & Baptiste Rouveure
Edited by Baptiste Rouveure
Production companies : Anonymous Animals Films
Running time: 64 minutes

(Source: press release)