The Beating of the Butterfly´s Wings

Colour, 35mm
France, 2000, 90 min
Section: Another View

Synopsis

The story unfolds during a single day at whose end a young man finally meets a young girl, now under the appropriate circumstances which might change their lives. This encounter would not have occurred had it not been for a broken coffee-maker, a child’s bad dream, a piece of chocolate, a photograph soiled by a pigeon, a little white stone, money discovered in an empty milk carton, a yellow jacket thrown out on the street… A French proverb states that even a single flutter of a butterfly’s wing over the Atlantic can cause a storm over the Pacific. The film’s director adds: “Don’t hesitate sometimes to take a chance action or to do something silly because this random act or stupidity might change the order of the world.“ This film which shows that the most inconspicuous gesture could influence our fate, is created as a mosaic with a light and humorous touch and rightly deserves the award for Best Film it took away from this year’s International Festival of French-Speaking Films in Namur.

About the director

Laurent Firode is a self-taught filmmaker. After several short films which were acclaimed at various film festivals, he made his first feature Le Battement d’ailes du papillon which won the award for best film at the International Festival of French-Speaking Films in Namur, Belgium. Filmography: La mort du chanteur de Mexico (short, 1995), Super bon prix (short, 1996), Le cri (short, 1996), La nuit est belle (short, 1997), La cité Raymond-Queneau (short, 1997), Les astres (short, 1997), Les menteurs (short, 1998), Le battement d’ailes du papillon (feature debut, 2000).