How Claire Denis pulled off directing back-to-back movies during the pandemic

AVC: Please elaborate on that violence.

CD: This couple is happy together, but the memory of the ex-lover, when she sees him, brings back the past. And not only the past but also a big question: why is he there? Is it by chance, or maybe not? It’s like a trigger. Sara knows whatever she would say to Jean about [François] are only words. They cannot [honestly] translate the turmoil she was going through [on the inside].

AVC: How did you navigate Stars At Noon, shooting it in Panama?

CD: So many people exiled from Nicaragua in Panama helped us with the accent. The beauty of Nicaragua is unbelievable. There is a big lake in the middle of it, like a sea, and it’s surrounded by volcanoes. It’s unreal almost. Panama is beautiful, but there are no volcanoes. The big thing there is the canal so I tried to figure out a way to recreate in Panama what I had felt when I was in Nicaragua.

AVC: Were you attracted to Denis Johnson’s novel because it had parallels to the themes you explore in your films, like alienation or being in exile?

CD: I discovered Denis Johnson [approximately] 17 years ago. He is such a great writer. I started with Jesus’ Son, his most famous novel. And then [read] his poetry. When I read The Stars At Noon, I cannot say I recognized something in it from my own life, but I recognized very much the scenes that were described. I had the feeling, as I was reading novel, that I knew those things. I’ve never been in Nicaragua. I never wanted to be a journalist. I’m not an Englishman. But I felt this frustration, this desire to succeed and try desperately not to face failure as Trish is trying to. I didn’t dare to think this is a film for me. But then I wrote to Denis Johnson. We met. He was laughing when he said, “Don’t ask me to help you with a script, because this was something I tried to do and it was a mess. It’s a very painful story for me because it’s completely autobiographical. I wanted to be a journalist. I was in Nicaragua during the Civil War. And it’s the worst part of my life. And I wrote the novel because I had no chance as a journalist. So I wrote it with my memories.”

Then as I was shooting High Life with Robert Pattinson, I was in Germany, and I learned that Dennis Johnson had died from cancer. We had shared a lot in a way; not about Stars At Noon, but his travels in Africa, the music we like together, this way of always being a little bit ironic … He was a very sensitive man, but he had a soft, melancholic irony with everything. The love scenes he described touched me so much. So the novel has nothing to do with the Civil War. It’s only about them in bed in a way.

AVC: On that note, there is a very specific way you approach eroticism in this movie. There are layers of meaning in it. First, sex is transactional, done for money. It’s also a pastime born out of boredom. And it also propels love.

CD: I always knew that both Daniel and Trish approach love in their own very different ways. She would never admit she’s attracted to him. She would be mean in a way, you know? But we had to feel, of course, that she was attracted to him. And when she phones the hotel and hears that he checked out, she’s really desperate. Maybe it’s because she was hoping he would help her with money, but I think it’s a little bit more than that. It’s a deception. And he doesn’t want it. He says “I have a wife,” but he is the one who says, “I love you.” During the dance in that empty bar, he wants to hold her tight. Both try to reach each other to admit they are in love, but in a very different way.

AVC: How did you help Margaret Qualley and Joe Alwyn get in that intoxicated headspace and be bare in front of the camera, both physically and emotionally?

CD: I was bare too, you know? Because it’s the first time I was working with them as opposed to Vincent and Juliette. And I am shy too. I didn’t want a [intimacy] coordinator. We just had to trust each other. We started with the bar scene, the encounter, and then [went into] the room. So it gave us the [actual] trajectory of them [having] a sexual relation. But I have to tell you something. And maybe it’s a little bit naive, but I think the way it was written, the way we spoke about it, we felt we agreed on everything. There were never [disagreements]. I never remember Joe or Margaret telling me, “Oh, this is not possible.” They were so easy to work with. I was falling in love with them, actually.

AVC: Margaret Qualley is a fiery, spirited performer. I am wondering what performance of hers made you notice her.

CD: I saw her in Tarantino’s movie [Once Upon A Time In Hollywood]. I had written the script already, and thought, “This is her! This is it!” She’s a little arrogant, she doesn’t want to admit she’s suffering. She has this pride and I thought, “this is her!” I flew to New York, met with her, and she said yes. And she’s been waiting for more than three years for the film to be made. Joe, on the other hand, was a surprise because I wanted someone else, Robert Pattinson. Another actor [Taron Egerton] came in the end, because Robert was still in the Batman thing. Robert was probably tired and maybe not so convinced he was that Englishman. I don’t know. I never asked him, really. And then I met Joe through Zoom. He was in London. I was in Panama. And it’s strange, the way Zoom is such a hard way to communicate, but with Joe, I felt okay. He had read the script in the morning. I asked him, “Are you ready to fly?” And he said, “Give me one hour.” 50 minutes later he calls and says, “Yes, I’m coming.”

AVC: In both movies, and your entire filmography, you’re very attuned to the environment of the story. You focus on sensations and behaviors rather than over-explaining situations. You drop us in the middle of something so clearly defined in feeling and have us figure out the details.

CD: I am like that, but not on purpose. When I am working on a script, I fear sometimes that I do need explanation in the first version. But most of the time I think it makes the film too busy. And also, the Denis Johnson novel is like that. The characters don’t want to speak their truth. And so I invent [their truth]. I [thought] she came from Texas, and things like that. But I didn’t want to have that explained. And the way the Englishman is introduced in the novel: he’s the Englishman, no name. She [describes him as], “it’s like fucking with mist.”

AVC: Your cinema has such undeniable influence, particularly on several contemporary American filmmakers. I’m thinking of Barry Jenkins who is often vocal about his admiration for you. Also Eliza Hittman, and Charlotte Wells who made Aftersun, come to mind.

CD: I know Barry, and I’m [aware of these filmmakers], but also I’m not aware [of my influence] because it would be terrible to be aware of being influential. I approach each film as closely as I can. I try to be true. I always feel as if I am inside [my] films. Like with Joe and Trish, [I feel I’m] in that motel room and that car, intruding their intimacy and [being] moved by them. It’s so fragile. I feel so fragile making films. I don’t have a technique. And therefore, I would never think I could influence someone. And it’s not fake humility. It’s completely true. Each time a film is finished in the editing room before mixing, I think, “Oh my God. I’ve been through that.”