Le Centre Georges Pompidou

From one utopia to another

In 1977, the Pompidou Center, looking like an ocean liner amid the Paris rooftops, opened its doors. The subject of much controversy even before its inauguration, this cultural center of an entirely new kind took up the challenge of pluradisciplinarity and easy access to the public. Museum, cinemas, exhibitions, theatrical presentations and an open-stack library are on offer every day until 10 p.m.

To accompany the birth of this giant and give it an international reputation, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in the person of Patrick Imhaus, head of the cultural services department, decided to muster a maximum of means and to commission a major filmmaker. Roberto Rossellini quickly seemed the director with the most objective vision and one who could bring in the largest audience. The director of Open City in fact had devoted the second part of his life to making films for television, which he considered a privileged medium for the transmission of knowledge.

At first reluctant, the filmmaker finally said yes to the proposal, provided he could select the producer. It was only after meeting Jacques Grandclaude, founder-head of Création 9 Information, that he finally agreed to take part in the adventure. Intending to shoot the film in 35mm, he got this production structure to help underwrite the film.

Of course, Rossellini had a free hand in the way he intended to treat the subject. During the shooting, the director felt increasingly concerned about the Center. At first perplexed by such an innovative project, it gradually provided its full backing.

The resulting film, the last he would direct, was compellingly beautiful. It seemed to embody the quintessence of his style. There was no commentary, just the natural sounds of the place. The film was broadcast by TF1 and the RAI in the wake of the elections. It virtually has not been seen since. Resembling an ethnological documentary, and comprising long dolly zooms lit by Nestor Almendros, the New Wave cameraman, it escorted the Center into film history. Other filmmakers would later film the Center - Fréderic Rossif, Benoît Jacquot and Alain Fleischer.

"Beaubourg is a major phenomenon," Rossellini declared in an interview with Ecran 77. "I looked at the phenomenon. (…) I used neither music nor narrator. I wanted to show Beaubourg. I hid dozens of microphones and recorded all the voices of the public thronging to Beaubourg."

This film would not have been possible without the determination of a few people, in particular Yvette Mallet, at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who arranged the meeting with Roberto Rossellini.

Aware of the historic importance of this moment, Jacques Grandclaude suggested that he film Rossellini himself, step by step, shot by shot, during the making of the film. Won over to this approach, which he smilingly described as "entomological," the director who had always refused to be filmed agreed to being filmed in this way, thus becoming the main actor of a "lesson in cinema." The man who had always dreamed of “a motion picture camera in the age of Michelangelo” was finally not displeased to be filmed at work by a crew with whom he felt in total harmony.

This complicity, this friendship, resulted in ten hours of 16 mm color footage, and more than 2,500 slides, conceived and directed by Jacques Grandclaude, and shot by the crews of Création 9 Information. They were never edited or shown.

Today, after the screening of Roberto Rossellini’s film, Le Centre Georges Pompidou, we will be showing, under the title Rossellini 77, a montage of selected rushes, which capture the special atmosphere of Rossellini’s film sets. We also include images taken during the “Social economy of film and television” seminar, which Rossellini, as president of the jury at the 1977 Cannes International Festival, had organized and chaired during the festival. An outstanding testimony to his philosophy and his combats, these were his last words. He passed away on June 3, 1977.

Thursday, 25 January 2007 at 2:30 p.m.

14h30 : Introduction by Jacques Grandclaude, producer
14h40 : Beaubourg, Centre d’art et de culture Georges Pompidou, a film by Roberto Rossellini, 57 mn., color, 35 mm, new print
15h40 : Rossellini 77, a film by Jacques Grandclaude, 35mn., color, 16 mm

Cinéma le Royal
8, avenue Foch
64200 Biarritz

Programming/Presentation: Anne-Michèle Ulrich,
Action Culturelle Audiovisuelle department, Georges Pompidou Center

The Pompidou Center would like to thank the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Jacques Grandclaude

France - 1977 - 57 mn - 35 mm - Colour

Director
Roberto Rossellini
Writer
Renzo Rossellini
Camera
Nestor Almendros, Jean Chiabaut, Emmanuel Machuel
Sound
Michel Brethez, Philippe Lemenuel
Editing
Dominique Faysse