Vacancy, by Alexandra Kandy Longuet
Case study
Friday 27 September 2024
9:30–13:00
Vacancy (2018, 75 mins)
Last refuge for the forgotten of the American dream, the motel in the USA is home to a whole population of left behind, drifting humans who, from crisis to crisis – economic and personal – have been dispossessed of all.
There are those who have lost everything. There are those who have left everything. Those who have forgotten everything. Those who still dream.
Drawn in by daily survival, they all trie to rebuild their life in this precarious nest, at the edge of the world.
I have been to hell and back
and let me tell you
it was wonderful
CREDITS
Written and directed by : Alexandra Kandy Longuet
Cinematographer : Caroline Guimbal
Sound : Alexandra Kandy Longuet
Editing : Agathe Hervieu
Sound Editing & mixing : Jean-François Levillain
Music : Thomas Vaquié
Language : english
2018 – 75min
Production : Eklektik Production, Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelless, CBA – Centre Bruxellois de l’Audiovisuel, Proximus, Shelter Prod
Program
10h-10h20 : Intro
Project genesis : interest for motels as space that created its own paradox ;
thought conceived as a place where space is as sanitized as human relationship in an utilitarian society, the motel quickly becomes the place of the forbidden ;
adulterous rendezvous, hideaway for people on the run, welcome place for former prisoners, drug dealers, prostitution and so on… To the point that FBI leader Hoover himself wrote “stay away from motels”.
Also a place for people changing life, people in-between, in transition, people about to…
Always located outside of the cities, the motels became more recently modern limbos. After the 2008 economic crisis, lots of people lost their house and found haven in motels where they can pay day to day. A correspondence emerges between spaces and individuals. Remote places, with precarious architecture and social relations, motels today attract, as if by mimicry, people who are themselves decomposed. Purgatory with colour TV.
A refuge that quickly turns into a trap : a motel room is not cheap.
10h20 : “Vacancy”, film screening
Presentation
- Why & how to make a social background film that implies dreamlike aspect ?
- Why California ?
- Playing with clichés : the motels in films – a decorum. Bagdad café, David Lynch etc.
- Playing with clichés : the protagonists. Repentant gangster & sex worker
- The American dream
Q&A
Topics that can be discussed :
filming drug consumers
- Ethics : Question of informed consent
- Being physically engaged in the filming process
- Show or not show drug use ?
- How to represent the trip
Intimacy
- How to find protagonist in a place that has been designed to avoid encounters
- Narrow space & relationship with protagonist
- Le hors champ / off camera
- People in transit – in between / limbos – people with no stakes
- Limbos and madness. Ghosts.
About Alexandra Kandy Longuet
Graduated from the École Nationale Supérieure d’Arts de Paris-Cergy and the University of Paris III, Alexandra Kandy Longuet participated in several exhibitions before leaving for Argentina. She then trained in cinema in Belgium. “As she left”, her first film received the Grand Prix of the Message to Man Festival and was selected in many festivals. In 2017, she is awarded ” Étoile de la Scam” for “Shipwrecked America” as well as in 2020 for the feature film “Vacancy”, which also received the Best International Documentary Award at the Jihlava Festival 2018. She also directs radio documentaries for RTBF and France Culture.
Practical Information
Date:Friday 27 September 2024
Time: 9:30—13:00
Venue: Pianofabriek (rue du Fort 35, 1060 Saint-Gilles)
Tickets are free, on registration only (limited space)
If you would like to attend, please email us at soundimageculture@gmail.com