The captivating work of Sylvain Tesson, Sur les chemins noirs (On the Black Paths), has been gracefully transposed to the screen by director Denis Imbert. The lead role is played by none other than the talented Jean Dujardin, who brilliantly breathes life into this story. The dark theaters of France are currently being lit up by this stirring tale which invites viewers to lose themselves in its meandering depths.
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A book, first and foremost. By the elusive Sylvain Tesson, an adventurer-writer who has traversed the barren landscapes of the world, in which he recounts his own story following an accident that disfigured him both physically and emotionally. He takes to these famous “chemins noirs” (remote paths away from the signposted routes of rural France) as a road to both crucifixion and resurrection. This poignant testimony deeply moved director Denis Imbert and actor Jean Dujardin, who coincidentally read it in parallel to each other and in whom the story sparked a mutual, urgent desire to embody and convey it.
And such was the luminous film born. Expansive views of this lesser-known France, accompanied by the rhythmic music of words spoken by Jean Dujardin. An inner voice that speaks to itself and to us, an echo that reverberates like distant drums. A journey not only across the peaks and valleys of this magnificent rediscovered France, but also through the most intricate mazes that hide within us.
Footsteps, sweat, pain. The actor’s entire performance is expressed through this muted, raw suffering. One must completely and emotionally strip themselves bare to convey this silence. A glance, a gait, just the right amount, always essential. Walking on these mountains and conveying each breath is a tightrope act, with no room for missteps. We can sense a possessed exhilaration. Creating the fear of faltering, instilling this fragility, is a gift given only to those who can give selflessly, to the point of complete surrender. And we, enraptured, witness an ongoing miracle.
As flashbacks and footfalls unfold, we come to understand the writer before the accident. Acclaimed and adored, perpetually and tirelessly fleeing forward to fill a void, going from signings to readings, from cocktail to cocktail, living in excess to feel alive, daring to tempt fate while believing he was living out his own. And then, the fall.
From this shattered body, an inner awakening takes place. The pieces perhaps find their rightful place. Scars in the flesh do not prevent the true light from shining through. On the contrary, they filter. Soothe. Rebuild.
Pierre, truly embodying the French meaning of his name, becomes one with the rocks that surround him, that he treads upon, that he embraces, with which he merges. Along the way, encounters. Each is intense. Pure. Clear. And adds stone to his own. Advancing on the path. Reciprocally. Humanly.
The stranger, the monk, the sister, the brother-friend, the aunt.
And to understand the initial void left by the departure of his whimsical, deeply loved mother, the mother with whom he identifies in his quest for the absolute. This mother or this earth, they become one. And Pierre regenerates from this earth as a fetus in its mother’s womb.
The dark paths as an umbilical cord. And we, the spectators, bear witness to a spiritual quest as much as we do a resurrection. Without Hollywood grandeur à la Cecil B. DeMille, without special effects. But utterly captivated by the beauty of the cinematography, the landscapes, the rhythm, the inner musicality, the silences and the words, the acting – if the word is not too inadequate – for the actor’s craft vanishes to give way to a total osmosis of all the senses.
And the finale, the culmination of this long journey, facing the triumphant Mont Saint-Michel, the deliverance like the cry of a newborn bursting forth, with a reborn, living, supremely alive Jean Dujardin/Pierre, confronting this sea/mother at last, in an intimate and colossal face-to-face. Profoundly moving.
