With “Le temps des secrets” Christophe Barratier in the footsteps of Pagnol

• Behind the camera in the adaptation of Marcel Pagnol's novel "Le temps des secrets", Christophe Barratier tells us about his relationship with the Provençal author.

• Between filming anecdotes, games with children and contemporary additions, the director of “Les Choristes” tells us about his “time of secrets”.

In the shadow of the Garlaban, a massif around which Marcel Pagnol weaved the stories of his childhood memories, Christophe Barratier (

,

), director of

, which will be released in theaters this Wednesday, welcomes us .

From these hills overlooking Marseille and Aubagne where he filmed, he responds to

We remember the first two parts of Marcel Pagnol's childhood trilogy made in 1990 by Yves Robert, do you subscribe to a certain continuity with Le Temps des secrets?

I discovered 

and

 long before, thanks to my grandmother who was an actress in the theater before the war and who had played Pagnol's texts a lot. 

I remember that her house was studded with photos of Fernand Charpin or Fernandel, with whom she had played.

So when I was offered Pagnol, I rather had the impression of reliving the time when my grandmother showed me her films on television.

I had to look from one end to the other.

I then had more the impression of reconnecting with my childhood than with Pagnol.

Before doing something out of admiration for an author, it has to find an intimate echo in us.

And I realized that these intimate echoes are shared by many in Pagnol, because he is a great author who makes things very accessible to us.

And which precisely remains in a very contemporary sense.

How, 100 years later, Marcel Pagnol remains relevant?

Because he wasn't only interested in traditions, he was interested in how we live with them.

And I don't think it's nostalgia.

I saw the two child actors, how much they took over their character.

After a while, it was they themselves who went to the hills to play stick fights or make little traps.

In Pagnol, we have this coexistence between urban and city dwellers, and I was lucky that Léo (who plays little Marcel) is a pure Parisian, while Baptiste (Lili des Bellons) was born in Aubagne, like Marcel Pagnol.

Why this movie now?

It's really dating.

The producer came to offer it to me, I hadn't thought of it.

I read it, I said to myself that it was really good.

It's about a period, adolescence, where friendships can start to break down.

And then,

is not only those of children, because it is the age when we realize that parents can also have secrets.

There are additions in the film with the development of story arcs that do not exist in the book.

Why this ?

Yes.

However, I would say that these are not additions, but things that I have muscled.

For example, the character of Augustine, the mother, as in the book, is a mother that we would like to have in life, but who lacks a bit of relief for the cinema.

I read that there was Pagnol's aunt who took care of an association for women's rights, a cause which was still in its infancy at the time.

In the novel, it is in two lines.

I said to myself: “Hey, I'm going to make it a subplot”.

And that fits in very well with the contemporary look.

Exactly, but still dates from that time.

In spite of everything, I had to beef up all the conflicts.

That is to say that in the book, he doesn't really get angry with his parents, nor with Lili, he pays less attention to him, but Lili doesn't hold it against him.

And all that, I beefed it up a bit, because I think that today we are used to things a little more in excess, dramaturgy.

So, I darkened the picture a little so that, perhaps, at the end, the resolution would be all the more moving.

Do you have a very pagnolesque filming anecdote.

A moment when you said to yourself, “there we are”?

There is the place where I wanted to make the source, but there was no water.

So we called goatherds who gave us a good idea.

They called for muleteers and we found ourselves as we were back then.

They brought us about two tons of water up a hill with pipes, like we could do in the old fashioned way.

And suddenly, we were near our camera, we heard: “Eeeh Ooooh”.

Suddenly, the water spurted out and we were able to film it for a quarter of an hour.

What was the hardest part of making?

Probably time management.

When you shoot with children, you can't shoot eight hours in a row.

For example, there is a dinner scene at the beginning of the film where we are in the magic hour, with an orange pink light.

And to have it for a dinner that lasts 3 minutes in the film, we had to come back three evenings in a row, waiting for the same shade.

Also, summer is a great time to talk about, but not to film.

Because August overhead light is terrible.

We can't film between noon and 3 p.m., everyone squints.

We filmed in September.

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