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Belgium / All works

Cinema

If the Wind Frightens You

Si le vent te fait peur

Émile Degelin · 1960

Synopsis

Pierre and Claude, a brother and sister, spend their holidays camping in the dunes of the Belgian coast. As the days pass, in an almost lunar landscape of sand and North Sea, they become aware of the intimate bond that unites them and of its ambiguity. The two children spend their days there, to a jazz score by Martial Solal, in a very carefully composed black and white.

Context

It is the director's first feature film, and the dialogue was written with Jacqueline Harpman, then his wife. The cinematography is by Frédéric Geilfus, the music by Martial Solal. The film was shown in competition at Cannes in 1960. A recent review praises the beauty of the photography of the coast, and reproaches it for overly literary dialogue. The following year, another of his films, a short, received at Berlin a Silver Bear, extraordinary jury prize.

Who it is for

An eighty-three-minute feature film, in French, in black and white, in a very restrained manner.

Prizes and reception

Presented in official competition at the Cannes Film Festival in 1960, and noted for the beauty of its imagery.

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