David Ernaux-Briot, son of Annie and Philippe Ernaux, was born in 1968. He grew up in Annecy and later on Cergy-Pontoise. After studying science, he decided to focus on scientific journalism and contributed to specialized TV programs such as E=M6 and C’est pas Sorcier. He wrote and directed the mini-series Théâtre des Machines, Corpus, Art et Sport for the platforms Universcience and CANOPE. The Super 8 Years is his first feature-length documentary.
The author of some twenty works of fiction and memoir, Annie Ernaux is considered by many to be France’s most important literary voice. She won the Prix Renaudot for A Man’s Place and the Marguerite Yourcenar Prize for her body of work. More recently she received the International Strega Prize, the Prix Formentor, the French-American Translation Prize, and the Warwick Prize for Women in Translation for The Years, and, most importantly, she was awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature. Her other works include Exteriors, A Girl’s Story, A Woman’s Story, The Possession, Simple Passion, Happening, I Remain in Darkness, Shame, A Frozen Woman and A Man’s Place. Recently, two of her books were adapted into award-winning films: Simple Passion by Danielle Abrid (Cannes Label 2020); The Happening by Audrey Diwan (Venice Golden Lion 2021).
19:OCT 21h15—21h45 30'
Batalha Centro de Cinema
The creation of Les Années Super 8 ultimately involved the assembling of a text written and read by the writer Annie Ernaux, my mother, and the Super 8 films shot by my father, her late ex-husband. But over the eight weeks of editing images, leaving aside the question of narrative, it was the relation-ship between images and narrative that came up. Evidence, symbol, alternative discourse or embodiment of words: what is the relationship between images and the writer’s narrative?
Documentaries promise the viewer the truth and nothing but the truth. Autobiography promises its reader nothing else. How do these two promises manifest themselves in Les Années Super 8? What role do music and sound effects play in realising the construction of a sincere discourse? How does the editing, supported by Annie Ernaux’s narration, inscribe the intimacy of a life in the social and political depth of the 1970s?
Masterclass in partnership with Instituto de Filosofia da Universidade do Porto
