INTERVIEW WITH LUC & JEAN-PIERRE DARDENNE

How did you get the idea? - Luc Dardenne: We thought of the character of K from 'The Castle' by Kafka. He doesn't have access to the castle, he's rejected by the village and he begins to question his own existence. It gave us the idea of a girl who is cast aside, who wants to gain something that will allow her back into society, but she is always knocked back. We decided to make her obsessed by the idea of having a job, just like anybody else, and of having a normal life. We decided to give this fixed idea to the character and to see just where this would lead her... From this point, we wrote a great deal, with numerous re-writes, before finding Rosetta. - Jean-Pierre Dardenne: We decided not to begin with a plot but with a character. The idea was to put the spectator in a position where he asks himself: 'What will happen to her? How will she deal with what happens to her?' You say that Rosetta is a warrior... - Jean-Pierre Dardenne: With or without work, it is a constant battle that people lead today. Not working, regardless of choice, places you on the margins of society. You lose your reference point, you are unstructured, you don't know your place anymore, or even if you still have one. Work gives you certain duties and rights. When you are no longer working, you lose your rights. Work becomes a rarity. There is nothing left. To get a job you have to take someone else's place, and you have to be prepared to do certain things to get that. - Luc Dardenne: Rosetta is a warrior who never gives up, who is always prepared to attack. She is a survivor who lives in a primary state: water, accommodation, food. She has found her own weapons, a survival system. Boots for the camp-site, shoes for work, a box for bait, bottles for fishing... She tinkers about, constantly obsessed by the search for a job. Why did you make her live on a campsite? - Luc Dardenne: We wanted to place Rosetta in living conditions where she feels she has almost reached rock-bottom. How did you create the character of Riquet? - Luc Dardenne: We took more time to find him than we did with Rosetta. He is a straightforward thinker. He tells only one story. Rosetta is the opposite, she spies, she suspects, she peers through doorways, she always fears a conspiracy against her. With Riquet, it is the story of someone helping someone else. Riquet says: 'I'm here for you', but Rosetta doesn't understand that. - Jean-Pierre Dardenne: When he reappears at the end it's because he can't accept what she has done. He comes back to haunt her. She has become a little like his prey. By harassing her, he keeps her alive. This tense, stubborn, hardened girl will finally open up and accept someone's help. From the first shot of the opening scene the spectator is disorientated. - Jean-Pierre Dardenne: The first scene of the film had to be both simple and violent, to introduce Rosetta, her situation, and her reaction to things. This scene reveals her character in its entirety. It shows the violence to which she's subjected, and it shows how violently she herself reacts.. If you've understood everything from that point, then normally, everything that follows should fall into place. - Luc Dardenne: Giving too much away prevents the character's existence. The less you say about a character the more they exist. So we try not to give away too much. Everything is done in that way, the mise-en-scene, the editing. Rather than give too much away, we try to find the essential movement of the character. What's touching and moving, is that she doesn't pretend to live. She fights, ready to do seemingly unacceptable things under any other circumstance. She refuses to pretend, like her mother does, Because she's constantly waging a battle, she becomes withdrawn, she becomes hard. She isolates herself from others, it's something inside her that's stronger than her, that inhabits her, something over which she has no control. Rosetta's attitude towards her mother is surprising. Her mother represents decay. She is scared of that. >> back