Sur la voie critique

The lesson of Sur la voie (first version) was this: the love of one thing makes us desire another thing, when school is successful, it makes us want to leave it, the best thing that school can produce is to drop out… Pierre and Yacine both leave their school and home to go elsewhere, and learn to see what it’s like. One of them draws, the other films. They set off, have encounters, marvel, fall asleep. They advance on their path without looking back, along the Seine and the railway line, it is also an inner journey. When you asked me to go back over the film with you, you were basing it on what people said to you after the screenings : a women who thought she had seen her “own disappearance, death everywhere in the film, in each shot”; and a friend who, after a long silence, managed to tell you that he hadn’t recognised you. The feedback was rather gloomy, and surprising as I had found the film joyful and I recognised you, so to speak, a little in both of these boys, who had returned to school to escape home (and even if you yourself don’t travel). This feedback had troubled you. We talked about the film together. You told me you wanted to continue, review the editing, write another version that included its critical aspect. Mathilde Girard (Excerpt from Conduire, marcher, raconter… in the DVD book Sur la voie, P. Creton, Editions de l’Oeil, 2021)