Homecoming is an apt title to describe prolific French filmmaker Catherine Corsini’s reappearance in Cannes following a long history with the festival, from The Divide and Replay in Competition in 2021 and 2001 respectively, to acting as president of the Camera d’Or jury in 2016.
Corsini returns to Competition with Homecoming, a seaside story set in summertime in Corsica about a middle-aged woman (The Divide star Aissatou Diallo Sagna) working for a wealthy Parisian family who invite her to join them on holiday with her daughters, played by Suzy Bemba (L’Opéra, Kandisha) and Esther Gohourou (Cuties). Denis Polyadès and Virginie Ledoyen also star.
The film was caught up in turmoil ahead of its inclusion in official selection when the festival offered Corsini a berth, only to leave Homecoming out of the announcement in the wake of charges of bullying and harassment against the director and inappropriate acts against two minors during the shooting of an intimate scene. The festival confirmed Homecoming’s inclusion 11 days after the press conference.
Corsini’s longtime producer Elisabeth Perez of Chaz Productions produces in co-production with France 3 Cinema and Le Pacte which will release the film in France; Playtime handles international sales.
Where did the idea for the film come from?
I wanted to make a film about what it means to be young today. I wanted to make a film about Corsica. It’s a complex territory for me. My father was Corsican and I didn’t know him because he died when I was two years old and my mother took me away from this place. I went back only after I was 30, it was always a place that both scared me and attracted me. I also wanted to work with Aïssatou Diallo Sagna again. These were like three constellations that brought the story together.
How would you describe what Homecoming is about?
I wanted to focus on the question of: what does it mean to be a stranger in a place? And the unsaid words linked to a family story, the things that are revealed during this summer, a season filled with warm weather and heated emotions. And how the sexuality of each of the three women in this family, each one experiencing things in a way for the first time. It’s also about how people aren’t always what they seem.
The film is an ensemble, but focuses on the three women. What was your casting process for Suzy Bemba and Esther Gohourou?
I thought I was looking for mixed-race actresses until I met them. I first saw Esther in a casting and she blew me away. She really has a gift – I was convinced right away even if I knew it would be complicated because she was a minor. I had found another actress who never worked in film for the role of Jessica and then my second assistant director pointed me towards Suzy Bemba and she was incredible in the role of Jessica. She seems at first to be the most annoying character, the overachiever, then we realize she is on a more profound quest.
Was there improvisation on set or do you stick to the script exactly?
Everything is written. In the party scene, where the girls are in a bathroom and are meant to have taken drugs, they worked with a coach and I let the cameras roll and shot long sequences so I could let the actresses express themselves. Esther improvised and brought her own touch to certain texts – it was pure genius.
How would you describe your relationship with Cannes?
I don’t have a great relationship with Cannes actually. I first came with my short film Ballades in 1984. Youth Without God in 1996 went well, but La Repetition in 2001 was more divided. Today, people like the movie, but it wasn’t as well-received when we presented it in Cannes. I came back with Trois Mondes in 2012 and that wasn’t very well-received. When I came back in 2021 with The Divide, I hadn’t been back in Competition for 20 years. This is only my third time in the main official selection and I’ll be 67 years old on May 18 so I can’t say I’ve been given the royal treatment in Cannes. When An Impossible Love wasn’t selected [in 2018], it was hard because we loved the film and thought it had a place there. I was moved when Homecoming was selected.
It was selected, then unselected, then selected again – a bit of a stormy start to the Competition this year. What was that like for you?
Thierry [Fremaux] called me the night before the press conference at midnight after calling me a couple of days before to tell me that the selection committee liked it, but I didn’t know how much or which section it might be in. We were all together waiting among our production team. I felt immense joy when he called. We all spent the night drinking, celebrating among ourselves and with other directors who were selected. We woke up for the press conference the next day and Elisabeth told me, “There’s a catastrophe, a drama – the film won’t be announced.” Anonymous letters had been sent threatening my film, my reputation. But many members of the cast and crew sent me letters that made me sob, saying, “Catherine, don’t change. Stay the way you are.” Of course, there were a few people I didn’t get along with on the set, but I think on every set this is the case, and here their mission for revenge and the violence in them is stronger than mine.
How are you feeling about presenting your film this time?
I trust cinema. I trust this film. In the end, no one will remember these rumours or false accusations. All that will remain is the film itself. Directors have faults because we’re intense, there is a huge amount of pressure. We’re in a tense period where we want everything to be divided and simplified. I hope that films can be a place to come together and understand things. People might be disappointed when they see the film to see it is filled with tenderness and love, the scenes between the teenagers are very chaste, there isn’t much physical contact. People don’t understand that in film we can make it look like something is happening even if it isn’t actually happening.
With a story so anchored in your own personal experience, is there a character in the film you relate to most?
There is a bit of me in all of the characters. I was very close to Jessica, particularly in terms of her relationship with her father. There is a scene where she has a panic attack in bed when in her parents’ old house and when I was 15, I returned to my mother’s house and I cried and cried and thought of my father. When shot the scene in a house, I felt the same vertigo, the same violent emotions.
How do you feel now?
When I got to Corsica to film, I brought this burden with me and the sadness of my father’s death that has always been with me. Maybe my mother transmitted this to me and maybe in making this film, I can finally end my period of mourning.
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