Archive of films Conversation with My Gardener / Dialogue avec mon jardinier

France
2007, 109 min

Section: Official Selection - Competition
Year: 2007

Stars of French cinema Daniel Auteuil and Jean-Pierre Darroussin play a painter and his gardener, otherwise old friends from primary school who meet up again in the painter’s family home and re-establish and deepen their friendship amid amiable and caustic discussions.

Synopsis

A successful painter leaves Paris to return to the village in central France where he was born more than 50 years ago. Since the death of his parents the unoccupied house has been surrounded by gardens that the painter has neither the will nor the know-how to cultivate. To his great surprise his ad for a gardener is answered by an old friend from primary school. A mature, friendly bond develops between the two men that is enriched by the different experiences they have had in life. The gardener’s directness and the genuine spontaneity of his worldly wisdom, in particular, captivates the metropolitan, who takes a new view of life, love, and of vegetables and funerals. The inconspicuously elegant direction of Jean Becker makes room for the meeting of two outstanding French actors, Daniel Auteuil and Jean-Pierre Darroussin, whose brilliant performances rank the story of the friendship between painter and gardener among the best French films of the year.

About the director

Jean Becker (b. 1938, Paris) started his career in the film industry as an assistant to his father Jacques, but he also cooperated with Julien Duvivier and Henri Verneuil. At the beginning of the 1960s he started directing independently and cast Jean-Paul Belmondo in a number of crime films (A Man Named Rocca and Tender Scoundrel). After a nearly 20-year pause he returned with the film One Deadly Summer in 1983, a portrait of a girl looking for the criminals who raped her mother years before (which won four national César awards). More than 10 years later, Becker won acclaim for his psychological drama Elisa, with Vanessa Paradis and Gérard Depardieu in the lead roles. His filmography also includes: Children of the Marshlands (Les enfants du marais, 1999), A Crime in Paradise (Un crime au paradis, 2000), and Strange Gardens (Effroyables jardins, 2002). He is currently at work on his next film Deux jours à tuer.

Contacts

Studiocanal
50 rue Camille Desmoulins, 928 63, Issy les Moulineaux Cedex 9
France
Tel: +33 892 393 910
www: www.studiocanal.com

ICE 3
13 rue Yves Toudic, 750 10, Paris
France
Tel: +33 144 525 690
Fax: +33 144 525 691
E-mail: [email protected]

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About the film

Color, 35 mm

Section:	Official Selection - Competition

Director:	Jean Becker
Screenplay:	Jean Cosmos, Jacques Monnet, Jean Becker podle románu Henriho Cueca / based on the novel by Henri Cueco
Dir. of Photography:	Jean-Marie Dreujou
Music:	Ahmet Gulbay
Editor:	Jacques Witta
Producer:	Louis Becker
Production:	ICE 3
Cast:	Daniel Auteuil, Jean-Pierre Darroussin, Fanny Cottençon, Alexia Barlier, Hiam Abbass, Élodie Navarre
Contact:	Studiocanal , ICE 3

www:	www.studiocanal.com

Guests

Géraldine Lepicard

Sales Agent

Jean Becker

Film Director, Film Director

Jean-Pierre Darroussin

Actor / Film Director, Actor / Film Director

Louis Becker

Producer