Exclusive: Chrysalis Director Julien Leclercq Talks About His Next Film!

In France they talk about me like I’m a French American director because I see a lot of American movies. I don’t know a lot about America, but I do have a lot of DVD’s in my house of primarily just American movies. I don’t have a lot of French films. It’s my culture although I wasn’t born there.

All the French journalists talk about me because when you see the cinema of my friend Xavier Gens (Interview) or I think mine that feature action scenes, good lighting and sets, that are just like American cinema or even an International touch. In France it’s difficult to think about that since we don’t have the production value to better tell our point of view. I think there is a new generation of French director like Xavier and the directors Inside (Interview). There is a new generation now and I think it’s good to work in America and keep your European point of view like Paul Greengrass. When you see the biggest patriotic films it seems to always be directed by an European director like Roland Emmerich, who did Patriot, Godzilla or Independence Day. It’s amazing – it’s a German boy! Then you have - Wolfgang Petersen who did Poseidon and Troy. These are both European people. I think it’s important to build a bridge between European and American people to make movies together. As well as for people like me and you that are passionate about cinema to meet, whether it’s at festivals like AFI Dallas, Toronto International Film Festival or maybe in Austin next September (laughs) this also allows us when we return home to open our minds to different things. So when we are then working on our next movie, our mind is now more open.

***
SMALL SPOILER FOR CHRYSALIS BELOW
***

My second film is different just like my first film because I traveled a lot with my first and I met different people and audiences and experienced different audience reactions. It’s very interesting for me as a director to see that and not just with the French audiences. Then take a movie like Indiana Jones and whether it’s the Sitges Film Festival or the Toronto International Film Festival, the audience reaction can be the same because cinema is an international language. It’s cool if you make a scary movie, as the audiences will go, “AHHHHHH!” You can see that in Chrysalis in the first scene with the car accident. When it screens the entire audience moves and goes, “AHHHHH!” I just experienced that here with a Dallas audience with a voice next to me in the theater going, “Fucking fuck fucking fuck!” (Laughs) It was cool and it’s working, it’s working!

A full interview I did with director Julien Leclercq on Chrysalis will appear on Twitch soon.

Related Links

• Chrysalis Review by Todd
• Chrysalis Official Site
• AFI Dallas