Same Time Next Year, Serge Gainsbourg

Following in the premieres of Persepolis (2007) and Waltz with Bashir (2008), I’d be in disbelief if Sylvain Chomet‘s The Illusionist (2009) doesn’t follow the pattern and would be even more surprised if Cannes 2010 edition doesn’t roll out the red carpet for Serge Gainsbourg, vie héroïque. The bio-flavored pic with surrealist elements has not been announced as an animated film, but I’m guessing there will be certain passages that will be animated by comic book writer and first time director of the picture Joann Sfar.

The director/writer who like Gainsbourg comes from a Jewish heritage, cited that Oscar Wilde’s novel The Picture of Dorian Gray and Ernst Lubitsch’s 1943 comedy Heaven Can Wait were key influences for his approach with this film. Casting having been completed late in 08′ (Lucy Gordon was cast as Jane Birkin, but there seems to be no mention of both singer’s lovechild in Charlotte Gainsbourg), the biopic on France’s enfant terrible is currently being filmed. I remember SG late in his life as the one person who might want to avoid in an interview — in his drunken state, the cigarette chomping singer slayed more than one journalist towards the end. I’m hoping that the film somehow captures his ability to charm, but displays his more displeasurable side to him. Here is an interview where he burned a big note (500 Francs). 

The film will trace the singer’s timeline being with the story of a little Jewish boy who saunters about in a Paris occupied by the Germans; of a young, timid poet (Eric Elmosnino – see black and white picture above) who leaves behind his paintings and his room beneath the rooftops to dazzle nightclub crowds during the Swinging Sixties. It’s a “heroic life” where the creatures of his mind become full-bodied on screen and his eloquence is a good match with his scandalous love affairs. From these elements arises a subversive work, with a loyal and rebellious citoyen as its star who stirs up the whole world until his death in 1991 at the age of 62. Laetitia Casta will play Bardot, with Mylene Jampanoi (from Martyrs) is set to play Gainsbourg’s last paramour, Bambou, and Anna Mouglalis tapped to play French singer Juliette Greco, who collaborated with Gainsbourg for many years.