Cruelty of Observation and

Tenderness of Gaze
Reflections on Cinema

Dominique Dubosc in conversation with Amrit Gangar

Dominique Dubosc is an award winning French filmmaker who

has been making films since 1968. He has a great interest in
Palestine and its history, which can be found in Dominque’s
extensive filmography of over forty works.

Themind’s keeps blinking in will never eliminate chance! That is: all our
Dominique Dubosc’s films – through attempts, failed projects, political defeats
windows that live in the walls, inviting our and death itself are never final: try again.
attention and gaze - to water, to boats, to Incidentally, biennial 15th Mumbai
roads, to automobiles, to the immensity of International Film Festival for Documentary,
the skies, to winds and their movements. In Short & Animation Films (MIFF) held by
time. In space. Inside. Outside. Of history. the Films Division, Government of India, in
Windows keep turning into metaphorical 2018 was celebrating the golden jubilee of
mimesis. And at the same time to a Dubosc’s film making practice that had
Mallarmean optimism; resonating one of begun in the historic year of 1968 in France.
his unconventional poems a roll of the dice It is also a proximate golden jubilee of his

..................................................................................................................................... September 2018 3

 Dominique Dubosc with Amrit Gangar
returning to Paraguay when he made two
films Cuarahy Ohecha (What the Sun Sees)
and Mnojhara (In the Region of Death) on
his 16mm camera, documenting lives of
peasant families in different parts of
Paraguay.
Almost half a century after, he returns
to Paraguay to make Retour au Paraguay
(Memoria Desmemoriada) in 2011. This
film was shown in the competition section
of the MIFF 2016 and then Dominique was
accompanied by his wife Danielle Haase-
Dubosc. Fag end of the year 2017 took away
Danielle from him and us. Absence!
Loneliness! A Mallarmean void of
signification.
After getting his diploma in ethnography
and psychology in 1965, Dominique Dubosc
started working as a photographer. He
taught social anthropology, directed short
films, taught the history of syndicalism, and
was a television director. Since 1987, he has
been teaching cinema at Middlebury
College and Columbia University. An award
winning French filmmaker who has been
making films since 1968. He has a great
interest in Palestine and its history, which
can be found in Dominque’s extensive
filmography of over forty works.
4 sk]väw_À 2018 .....................................................................................................................................
Comprehended and curated by the film
theorist-curator Amrit Gangar, MIFF 2018
was the only venue in India to have hosted
such a retrospective of Dominique Dubosc’s
oeuvre (except his video installations). On
the evening of 1st February 2018 and in the
cozy, compact auditorium on 10th floor of
on one of Films Division’s building in its
sprawling complex in Mumbai, audiences
were all attention to listen to Dubosc’s
reflections on cinema in general and his
films in particular. The conversation
virtually turned into a master class of sort.
Here we go...
A Throw of Dice Will Never
Abolish Chance
AMRIT GANGAR: Dominique, I want to
offer you a cup of tea, and then I will offer
you a piece of poetry. I will begin with the
poem. The poem has something to do with
Daniel, who passed away recently. ‘A Throw
of Dice Will Never Abolish Chance’, it is a
poem by StéphaneMallarmé. Unusual poem,
completely unconventional if you know this
poem. Can’t be recited, but I still take the
liberty of reciting it.
“CHANCE/Falls /the feather /rhythmically
suspended from the accident /to bury itself/ Baudelaire, the great French poet, is also
in original foams/ not long ago as far as his connected with Mallarmé, he had been
frenzy leapt to a top/ withered/ by the same influenced by Mallarmé. And you bring
neutrality of an abyss/ NOTHING /of the Baudelaire back in this film, and the film
memorable crisis/ or it was/ the event / Palestine Palestine remembered Pierre
carried out with the aim of no useless result Bonnard, who was a painter, post –
/human /WILL HAVE TAKEN PLACE/ a impressionist, and then we also had in the
common rise toward the absence /THAT other film of Palestine, the triptych connection,
THE PLACE/ lapping lower as any to Bruguel the Elder and Hieronymus Bosch.
disperse the empty act /abruptly as otherwise Through the triptych connection, you build a
/by his lie/ had based /the perdition/ in fascinating way of looking at the documentary
these parts /of the wave/ in which all reality film, the realism. That makes your work and
dissolves/ EXCEPTING /at the height / your worldview very profound and poetic.
PERHAPS/ so far as a place/merges with the Here you also bring sculpture. So, all these
beyond /except the interest/ as for him put together, constructs a kind of ellipsis. How
indicated /generally /to such indirectness by did it come? What is the worldview of the
such a slope/ of lights/ towards/ it has to be/ cinematography? We can show that, we can
The Seven Stars also North/ A also show some illustration about you look at
CONSTELLATION / cold of forgetting and this whole concept of cruelty of observation
of disuse/ not so much/ that it enumerates / and tenderness of gaze. We saw the leper’s
on some vacant and superior surface/ the film, and there is the scene of a woman
successive clash/ sidereally / of a total count painting eyebrow, which is an amazing scene.
in formation/watching over/ doubting / We will see that and begin from there. This is
rolling /glittering and meditating/ before it kind of a hinge the nail that shows the whole
stops itself /in some last point which idea of cruelty of observation and tenderness
consecrates it/ Every Thought emits a Roll of gaze.
of the Dice/ And roll o the dice never
eliminates chance/ A roll of the dice never
eliminates chance.” Cinema is not reproduction
DOMINIQUE DUBOSC: What I can
That is the poem, which I think is the anchor, say is that I never learned documentary film
to your work, to your worldview. The cruelty making, I discovered it through some shots
of observation and the tenderness of gaze are like this one, through different inventions.
other anchors, I feel. And your internal These discoveries may make up for
relations with poets, because we have conceptions of the documentary. I started

Pasolini said that eternalizing time, because you can repeat the
shots all the time. Now you have to have shots, otherwise you are
eternalizing nothing. But if you succeed in capturing something,
then this time will continue forever. If you succeed at capturing
something I think that this moment is therefore forever. If you
succeed in doing this, it might set up the world in movement.

..................................................................................................................................... September 2018 5

from scratch, I had no idea. In that case,
what I learnt from the leper’s colony was
two things, the documentary pact, you have
to have an agreement with the people you
are filming. Because they will give you their
image, you will give it back to them. And
documentary filmmaking is this exchange
of gaze. And especially with lepers, you can
imagine, they have lost their faces and they
have been rejected completely by their
society. The documentary pact must be
extremely strong. Otherwise, they would
never give their face. And in this case, this
woman is giving me her naked face because
lepers lose their eyebrows and for a woman
who used to be a beautiful woman, or,
supposedly beautiful, losing her eyebrows is
absolutely dramatic, and showing her face
naked without her eyebrows is dramatic.
But this would not have happened if I had
not found the way of filming it. And, it is
only when you find the right way of filming
something that it becomes real. It becomes
cinema. Otherwise, it remains an illustration
or reproduction. And cinema is not
reproduction. So in that case, I had an
Arriflex camera, a celluloid camera. And I
could put different filters in front of the
camera and so I used two filters: a grey one
in the back and a yellow one in the front, to
6 sk]väw_À 2018 .....................................................................................................................................
make a mirror, so that she could paint her
eyebrow right into the camera, right into the
lens. And this makes the shots. And so it is
through many discoveries like this one, that
I, little by little built what could be called a
style or my way of filming my vision. And
much later, someone invented or coined it
on my film, on my style, saying that the
characteristics of my films was this cruelty
of observation and the tenderness of gaze,
that you can see here. But it came little by
little. And some shots were achievements,
and we will see some other examples where
I think something was achieved. And I
think only when you achieve something,
you progress and you go somewhere and
you can talk about something.
Sensuality of Time
How do we feel time? How do we see time?
My hair growing from black to grey, is that
progress of time? When I saw this film, I
actually felt time was moving. When you go
back to the first film which we saw, you go
back 41 years, as though time was actually
coming back. So there was the movement of
time, I felt it atleast, the materiality of time,
time becomes so sensuous. The sensuality of
time that you achieve, it is marvellous. It
holds the circularity of time. How do you do Ozu’s Energy and Bresson’s Grace
this? What is the worldview of time?
AMRIT GANGAR: Now the dance
l I think this is something very specific comes into it, the music I forgot. All of these
to cinema, but not to all shots I think. arts are actually coming together and
Pasolini said that eternalizing time, because making a river that so many streams within
you can repeat the shots all the time. Now you, that form your cinematography, we call
you have to have shots, otherwise you are it documentary or now, doesn’t matter. But
eternalizing nothing. But if you succeed in you are dealing with realism in a very
capturing something, then this time will different way. You have the energy of Ozu
continue forever. Maybe this is like in and the grace of Bresson, I could see that in
modern physics, we don’t live in space, and this particular film all through.
we live in time. All the time is expanding
and maybe all those moments that we are
living are out there somewhere, obviously Image and the Process of
they are there somewhere. If somebody Deconstruction
could look at us from a planet that is at a DOMINIQUE DUBOSC: Well, it’s
million year distance from here and they always very important to me. In the last
could see us living now in a million years. I film that you saw, as you know, Bresson
don’t know if I am being clear, yes if you wrote a lot and I, strongly advise you to read
succeed at capturing something I think that his small book called ‘Notes on
this moment is therefore forever. If you Cinematography’. Because, it is all his
succeed in doing this, it might set up the experiences in short sentences and most of
world in movement. I always say that I am a them are extremely deep. Now I am referring
lover of Indian dances especially Kathak. I to one thing he said. He said,
have seen Uma Sharma, for example, just cinematographer should deconstruct reality,
showing two students mantra, and it was split it into elements, image, sound, just
almost a trigger, and I was almost elements. And put these elements back
intoxicated. I should say all documentary together. But, in a slightly other way, so that
shots are successful and they should all be we can see them as something new, it won’t
successful, they should be like these be just reproduction, it won’t be just
mantras, they should set something in something we see through, through routine,
movement.

Palestine Palestine

..................................................................................................................................... September 2018 7

 Palestine Remembered
through our habits. That we don’t see
because we are in our thoughts and we are
in our own life. And we usually walk in the
street like blind people. We don’t look at
things.
The cinematographer through this
process of deconstructing, and putting back
together things, makes things visible for the
viewer. I will give you an example. Some of
you, I hope have seen my last film. And in
that, in the first real sequence after the
credits is a corner, a street corner. There are
only two shots. One shot and reverse shot,
this is Bressonian . In Bressonian, you have
at most, three or four shots, like four notes
in music. And that makes a melody. But you
have to have the same shots here. In that
sequence I have two shots, one from the
other side of the street, and one, the reverse
shot. And I am playing with that, it is very
simple. It is a small music to start the film.
And then, the sound is deconstructed. I
have completely deconstructed. There are
8 sk]väw_À 2018 .....................................................................................................................................
mainly, big buses going up the street, very
noisy. And there is a boy with a small cart,
supermarket cart, in the middle of the buses.
And there is also someone coming, who will
cross the street, and there is another person
pushing a wheel barrow, coming from the
right.
So, I have taken apart all these sounds
and put them back together. And at a certain
moment, although you have all these buses,
very noisy, you can hear only, the boy
pushing his cart, and then all of a sudden,
the buses again. This is what happens.
Although this is very subjective, this is the
way we live. We can concentrate on a detail
and eliminate the rest. Now you have to do
it, in a subtle way, so that it is still realistic.
But, it brings you into my universe, my
reality. And I don’t think that there is one
reality. Each one of us have one reality, and
the filmmakers should bring people into his
reality, and so allow the viewer to connect
with his reality. So that is the way of doing it.
I was aware of that boy, I was interested, I of doing it, through instantaneous reaction.
was thinking that he is probably making his That is his style which he developed mainly
living by delivering goods like this, and so, from Marie Menken, who invented that
for one second, it is him that you gear and style. And maybe this is what we are doing
see. And then I go back to the buses because here, in this moment. One night I was
although I didn’t know it at that time and I discussing with Jonas and I had this
really didn’t think of it, at that time, these romantic idea that the underground
buses were very important for me because filmmakers in New York in the fifties and
this is the moment when I left that woman the sixties, which might be with the neo
at the end, among the buses. But at the time, realist movement in Italy after the war. It
I didn’t know that it was what I was shooting, might be the greatest movement in the
in fact. And so, to go back to Bresson, I quite history of cinema. And I was thinking again
agree we should technically, especially with in a romantic way that there were a group
the sound, use all the elements and then kind of school, or a group. But he said no, he
bring them back and mix them in a new said that they were just people, they knew
way, so that you can hear something, and each other and they had beer sometimes at
the same thing with the image. night and one of them would come with
something and they would all take a look at
The Fiction, Non-Fiction Dilemma it. And one night, Marie Menken came and
showed them a small film, where she had
You also say touching the real with the real, been crossing Manhattan, and shooting in
retouching the real, actually. I don’t agree pixilation, that is, image by image.
with this word ‘documentary’, generally, it is
contestable. The moment you see through the
viewfinder, it becomes a fiction. The way you Jonas Mekas and his Praxis of
describe this, it is a fiction of yours. Filmmaking
Yes, but I would say, I had a discussion
l Jonas filmed like this in my film
with Jonas (Mekas), and he was in the street Celebrations, shooting image by image, or
and he insisted that he is a documentator, I using some, using the normal
mean he is, he might be called an Avant cinematographic speed, 24 images per
Garde, very great Avant Garde filmmaker. second, but just for one second, then going
But he always tries to document something, back to image by image, just doing
document the Lithuanian people living in something like this. And the next day, or the
Brooklyn at first. Now he has a special way next week, Stan Brakhage did two films he

I always say that I am a lover of Indian dances especially Kathak.

I have seen Uma Sharma, for example, just showing two students
mantra, and it was almost a trigger, and I was almost intoxicated.
I should say all documentary shots are successful and they should
all be successful, they should be like these mantras,
they should set something in movement.

..................................................................................................................................... September 2018 9


could master that technique in two days,
because he was very clever. He got bored
with it and he left it. It took Jonas 10 years to
master the technique, but he used it for 60
years, and it became the core of his style. So
maybe, some of the things I am telling you,
or the things you have seen, well maybe
some of you will develop them. I will use it
and then it will develop and I will give you
an example. We will be able to see that. At
night I used to work at the Museum of
Mankind’s auditorium in France.
Jean Rouche would allow me to use his
auditorium and sometimes I would see him
in the screening theatre. And he was
screening his films and saying his
commentary in front of the screen. I was
struck by not the fact if it was improvised or
not. He knew what he was going to say. But
10 sk]väw_À 2018 .....................................................................................................................................
The Homosexual or the Difficulty
of Self-expression
the improvisation was about the rhythm. I
mean he improvised the rhythm of the film.
So the words were coming out of the image.
It was a living commentary, as opposed to a
canned commentary. It is like fresh food as
opposed to canned food. And this kind of
commentary, seemed to me extremely
interesting. And I wanted to make a film
about that, just a short one. But later on, I
was commissioned to make one hour long
sequence shot. And I discovered the interest
and the reality of that kind of speech, I mean
living commentary, by myself, because I had
to shoot for an hour. I was not in front of
the screen; I was in front of reality and
shooting with the camera for one hour and
speaking at the same time. So what I was
saying was completely different from a
commentary that I would have read. It was
to speak and to breathe at the same time. It l I remember a Paraguayan
was tiring to walk and to frame. I was so tired. photographer, a good friend of mine who
I had to breathe and speak at the same time. was absolutely scandalised. I mean, I was
And this made for a completely different shocked by the idea that I would mix black
way of speaking. I think that the content too and white, and colours and he couldn’t make
is different because it comes from the body. out a meaning and I told him that the colour
My body was speaking. It was not something shots are in colour and that black and white
only intellectual. And I didn’t continue. It’s is in black and white. That’s all. And when I
like with Brakhage and Marie Menken’s cannot make a colour shot, I put it in black
pixilation thing, he got bored with that. And and white because I think there is a basic
I can’t say I got bored with that, but I didn’t economy in art and everything should have
continue. But a very famous French a meaning. You should use as little as you
filmmaker Alain Cavalier, who is maybe the can. This is another Bresson mantra, you
most important French filmmaker, he saw know, “never repeat something”. If you say
that and he was shooting big film in 35 mm. something with the image, don’t say it with
He dropped that and he has been making the sound. Or if you say something with the
little films with little cameras, and speaking sound, you don’t need to say it with the
at the same time, he developed it for the last image.
30 years, like Jonas with pixilation for the
last 50 years. What Cavalier developed is Colour could impoverish the shot
extremely interesting. It is always difficult to
speak and film at the same time. But what You use as few elements as you can and
comes out is always interesting and lively, it all the elements should be meaningful. Now,
is something absolutely different. most of the time, especially when you don’t
control the colour, this colour goes against
the shot, it impoverishes, instead of
Black & White, Colour and Sound enriching the shot. It is almost a
The last film is a conglomeration of all your contradiction, you are trying to do
previous works. It is black and white, and something beautiful and there is a horrible
then suddenly you have colour. There is this colour somewhere. These cameras, they
symphony of colours that you create in the produce generally horrible colours, I mean
last film, which is very interesting. You have very cliché colours and it is not interesting
only made one colour film, ‘Palestine usually. But it becomes even worse in most
Palestine’, but this film is kind of different. environments where you have horrible

When you don’t control the colour, the colour goes against the shot, it
impoverishes, instead of enriching the shot. It is almost a
contradiction, you are trying to do something beautiful and there is a
horrible colour somewhere. These cameras, they produce generally
horrible colours, I mean very cliché colours and it is not interesting
usually. But it becomes even worse in most environments where you
have horrible things. So usually I use black and white.

..................................................................................................................................... September 2018 11

 Lip or a Taste for
Collective Action (1976)
things. So usually I use black and white and
also because I started with celluloid and we
had very good films in celluloid and double
and triple X in Kodak. I don’t want to make
this difficult, especially since they have
disappeared which is unbelievable. Kodak
was like the world itself. They had these two
very good films, double X in black and white
and I thought I could not control the colour.
It is much more difficult in documentary
than in fiction. In fiction, I have heard that
they painted the leaves of the trees with the
colour that seemed correct to the director.
The documentary filmmaker can never do
that. I mean, you have to react
instantaneously and so I couldn’t really use
colour.
Shifting from the film to video
When I shifted to video I used very
small video format and the colour is very
bad. It is mixed, the synchronisation of the
three colours, although, they have only two
usually. In DVD, there are only two colours
and the third is built from the previous one
and it is pretty bad. So as Amrit said, I have
only made one attempt to make a colour
film and this was for political reasons. I had
decided to accompany a friend who was an
12 sk]väw_À 2018 .....................................................................................................................................
Dreaming on 125th Street (2008)
illustrator in Palestine at a moment when
the Israeli Army had reoccupied all Palestine
and all the main cities were under curfew.
So their situation was extremely tense and it
was absolutely stupid to send him there in
those circumstances, but to me it was
interesting because I thought I knew him.
He had a world of himself; an imaginary
world, which is very rich, with full of
animals and things like that. So I made this
bet and making a documentary film is
generally starting with a bet. So I bet that he
might make some illustrations or some
drawings, not immediately, not on the spot
because he never does that.
But later on, that was a big bet. And he
succeeded in enjoying six illustrations only
one year later and I thought maybe we can
make a film together with his illustrations
and my images, but to achieve that I thought
my images must have some pictorial
dimensions and nature. And I knew
Palestine quite well and I loved Gaza. It used
to be a very important cultural center,
university center. It was very famous in the
old days. Cavafi used to love to go to Gaza
and I myself in the first years of the second
Intifada loved to go there. I met many poets
and it was a small harbour like in France, at
the end of the 19th century. Little harbours
in the Mediterranean Sea where Colette and tree. And then they developed that special
the others used to go. And also the kind of painting where everything is in
Impressionists at the end; they started colour instead of the red we could have only
around Paris and then went to the Channel fought for soundtracks on the editing table.
and moves back to Paris and some of them, Basically, we were using, only four
Impressionists and post-Impressionists soundtracks and in video, you can use as
moved to South of France, especially many as you want. So I started using
Gauguin and Van Gogh moved to Arles and between six and ten soundtracks at the same
Bonnat had a house right on the sea and time. And I started introducing in the
they painted these country sides and the soundtracks other sounds which are not
Mediterranean Sea and so I wondered if I sync-sounds I thought that sync-sounds
can do something like that, like an were interesting and Kouz and others
Impressionist painting of Gaza, Gaza under developed something interesting in the
bombing, Gaza during the war but show the Cinema Verite in the 60s but on the other
people in their environment as Bonnat hand it was very negative in terms of
would have painted. imagination, they stuck many of the young
filmmakers in those days in the 60s.
The process of making the They became very dogmatic concerning
Palestine film the sync-sound and forgot all the things you
can do with sound. It was only sync-sound
I didn’t succeed completely but in some that is all, reproduction of reality which is
sequences I think I sort of did something. not so interesting in my opinion. So to go
Then we could edit the film with his black back to this film, I started introducing lots
and white illustrations and my colour of things inside the sync-sound and well I
images and finally I think the film came out only have one example to show you which is
well enough. The shades were not grey; very simple. We are on the road going to
before them in the history of painting, when Rafah which is a refugee camp which was
there was a shade, something in it was grey generally under heavy bombing and so I am
and they discovered that a shade under a in the taxi and there is the sound of the taxi
tree is green because of the reflection of the but at the same time I put a submarine in

The Days of our Death 1969

..................................................................................................................................... September 2018 13

 The Homosexual or the Difficulty
of Self-expression
the taxi. You don’t hear it but at a certain
point I removed the taxi and you stay in the
submarine. It is not only the submarine but
I put lots of animals or breaths and things
like that. So you are in a world that is full of
sounds that are in a way the sound of the
world, something that is there. I don’t
believe when people say it is marvellous, we
have small camera, we can do whatever we
want. I don’t believe masterpieces will be
made with telephones. There is no view
finder but you can do something, of course.
But without a view finder I don’t think you
can make a good frame. And I feel that it is
essential to frame through a view finder not
with a screen because in the view finder you
see the image. You are the first viewer of
your film and you see only the image if you
look, if you frame with the window.
Developing Variation
Then you see many things around. You
don’t see your image, you see the world. The
view finder is made to film something, to
frame something, and you keep the other
eye open to look around. I think basically
14 sk]väw_À 2018 .....................................................................................................................................
the frame is made by your legs and hands
just like when you drive and your spirit is
free to talk to your neighbour if you like to.
But you don’t have to think of what you are
doing. Making films or any form of art has a
very irrational aspect and I used to say
chances are half of it. And this case
eventually I came across a German
musicologist who was not an activist like
me. He was not very involved but was a very
important musicologist and we were friends
and we started talking about this film and
he introduced me to some concepts of
Cafinic music, I understood nothing. I was
interested in one of them maybe for wrong
reasons, which was called the Developing
Variation. You have a core of notes and
from there it develops and so I thought that
this was my political contribution. I thought
we should start this film from the core, from
the very image of that strike. This strike was
a very small strike. It was only one thousand
people but it became enormous. It became
worldwide because of its symbolic aspects.
It was a strike against unemployment and
about outsourcing. It was the first big strike
and they invented many things and they
conducted the strike in a very collective middle of the strike. It developed into three
way. For example, they stole half a billion months through the strike. I should with
Francs of watches to start with and they that image and go back to the beginning and
occupied the factory and they produced and tell the story of the strike. So this was how
sold the watches and they were never caught the film was constructed and of course, it
by the police until now. All the police in was kind of weird, I mean for an activist
France tried to catch them. They could film, other directors would have started
never make it. Out of the thousand workers from the beginning, explaining the
eight hundred participated actively in the pedagogy. And I did the contrary. I think
strike, working everyday like salaried people that is what makes the film resist, I mean it
like workers for the strike in working is still worth seeing, I think. I think that
commissions where they had special paper making a documentary film is not really
to develop, I mean a special role. siding with one or the other party, its
making and filming with the people, not on
Making a documentary film is not the people or about the people. So you
choose the people with whom you want to
siding with one or the other party make the film. You don’t side with them.
This is not what happens usually. Usually It’s not that I side with the Palestinians. I
the union leaders would lead the strike. I don’t believe in good or bad people. And I
mean six or ten of them. And the strength of don’t believe that there are people like the
the workers would be less. In this strike, French, the Indians or the Italians, this
they developed an enormous strength. This would be good and that would be bad. And
strike developed from April to June- July. In I think they are all equally bad. And if they
July it reached a point that was called in have the power, and I think that if the
France, the Lip summer, Lip was the name Palestinians were willing and having the
of the factory and it was a magical moment power, it might be as horrible as now, with
when this whole organization came to a the Israelis. If I may add something here,
kind of perfection and everybody in France that is interesting, I think, although it has
wanted to see that. And they all came. I got nothing to do with cinema, but I think it
mean thousands of people came to see that. is basic, the Israelis, although they are the
It was so unexpected and so extraordinary. winners, still consider themselves as victims.
And so I thought I should start the film with And the Palestinians, who are the losers,
that, that image, which was not right in the and who will probably lose till the end. I

It’s not that I side with the Palestinians. I don’t believe in good or
bad people. I think that if the Palestinians were willing and having
the power, it might be as horrible as now, with the Israelis. The
Israelis, although they are the winners, still consider themselves as
victims. And the Palestinians, who are the losers, and who will
probably lose till the end. But they never consider themselves as
victims. And there is a great difference between being a loser or a
victim. And this struck me very much.

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Paraguay Remembered (2015)
mean we are going from ethnocide to
genocide clearly, and they are the losers. But
they never consider themselves as victims.
And there is a great difference between
being a loser or a victim. And this struck me
very much.
Making documentary films is making
films with the people. I made this film with
the lepers, not about the lepers and much
less about the leprosy; the same with all the
films that I have made. At a certain point in
the strike, the government sent an envoy,
representatives to discuss with the workers.
And of course, in their mind, the mind of
the government and the media, this
discussion should have taken place between
the government and the envoy, and the
workers’ leaders. It could start in front of the
general assembly and continue in a
conference room or something like that. So
everything was prepared for that important
event: the envoy comes, the general assembly
is there, he addresses the general assembly
and all the cameras are there, facing him
and the worker’s leader is not there. He is in
the back, among the workers. And we knew,
16 sk]väw_À 2018 .....................................................................................................................................
Letter Never Written (1990)
because I was contacted by the workers, I
was working for them. So we knew that he
would be there in the back. So it’s very funny
because all the cameras are set and turned
in one direction, the wrong direction. And
everything happens in the back. As we were
insiders, we knew and everything happened
in front of our camera.
AMRIT GANGAR: I have this argument
Dominique, most of the cinema was invented
in 1895, or by 1929, we haven’t added so
much in last ninety years. Not even thought-
wise, that’s my argument. Would you agree?
Now this particular form that you developed
has its own energy, which I don’t find in
today’s documentary.
Art is something that happens
between the artist and the viewer
DOMINIQUE DUBOSC: Now this was
invented long before, there was no invention.
I am using something that was invented
long before. But I don’t quite agree with you,
that cinema as an industrial art ended in
1955. That was what used to be the general
agreement in the fifties. And I think it has you can see nothing else, but with sound,
developed enormously, we were talking of you can interpret, as I said before, with that
the New York Underground, for example. little scene in the street corner. You are still
They were enormously inspired by the neo- free to reconstruct that street corner and the
realists school and by Bresson. If you go to sound. You are not completely taken. You
Anthology Film Archives, they have a are taken into my world, but you are still in
collection that they call Essential Cinema. a realistic world. For example, if you take a
And in that collection of three hundred novel, I remember Virginia Woolf being
films, you have all the films of Bresson and completely pissed off by a film made on
Brakhage. Many things were developed and Anna Karenina. She said that this actress
are still being developed, like the pixilation. does not correspond at all, to her image of
I don’t think technology improved so much. Anna Karenina, but you are stuck with that
On the contrary, we have lost so much; the image. And you have great characters in
quality of the image, for example. It’s literature. And then you have only that
absolutely traumatic how much we have actress. Suppose you don’t like her, or if she
lost. I would say like Jonas, who cares. We means nothing to you, then, you are stuck
have to make do with what we have. Who with her. And so this is what happens many
shall refuse that? He said that video was the times when you adapt literature. But with
AIDS of cinema; that was his expression. sound it’s different. This is why sometimes,
But I don’t agree with that. Even if the video in the films I have seen, I have been
is much uglier than film, that is what we wondering why they didn’t do a good radio
have. And we have to make do with what we programme. Then it would have been richer.
have. And we can, for example, these Now they have blocked our imagination
horrible HD images; you can work on them with those images and now we are passive in
and make them less horrible. And in some front of that, instead of being active. And I
respects, there are some improvements, think this is essential to be active, to be free.
especially in sound, I think. And sound is
very important. Because sound gives the We have a very interesting word called Rasika
space, and I think that the use of sound in Sanskrit. The spectator is called ‘rasik’.
allows us to enter the personal world of the And this ‘rasa’ is actually shared, the sense of
filmmaker without imposing an image, sharing...
letting the viewer free. My idea of art is that
it is something that happens between the It has to do also with treatment of
l
artist and the viewer. It is not something space. I was struck by the fact that many
that is there as an object. It is something that young filmmakers think that they have to
is seen or heard or read. It is what happens follow the characters. On the contrary, you
between the two. And if the artist imposes have to have a distance so that you can
his view, then the viewer is not free, he understand what is going on. Television for
becomes passive. I think art is an active example, controls. It tells you what to think.
relationship and sometimes, I have seen I call it controlled cinema. And most films
some films where they are imposing their are controlled films. I believe that cinema
view, especially with the image. should be able to liberate us, be able to give
us a critical eye.
They say that is what happens in the
mind of the person I am filming. How do Transcribed by Thahani Sophia Jaheem
they know? They show you an image and

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