Let’s close our eyes, and listen to the sound of the first moments of Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du Commerce, 1080 Brussels (1975), masterpiece of the Belgian filmmaker Chantal Akerman (1950-2015). Let’s pretend we don’t know the story of this heroine, played by Delphine Seyrig, raising her son alone since the death of her husband, and prostituting herself between two household chores. Right from the start, we hear the hum of a gas stove, the clicking of women’s heels on the tiles, the percussive sound of a lid being placed on a casserole dish, and suddenly the shrill call of the doorbell. A door opens, followed by two ” Good morning “the woman first, then the man, then the rubbing of a fabric, a few more steps that seem to be moving away, the creaking of a door, and finally a few seconds of silence.
Jeanne Dielman… will be screened on June 29, as well as on July 2 and 4, at the La Rochelle Cinema festival (from June 28 to July 7), in an audio-described version for the visually impaired or blind, as part of a retrospective dedicated to Chantal Akerman – spectators will be able to listen to the audio-described text with headphones.
Many things have been said about this radical film, choreographing the precise gestures of this woman, her routine, which will become distorted during a meeting with a client. But rarely has the sound been so dissected, during the audio-described version produced by Marie Diagne, former editor.
The “eyes from within”
We witnessed two phases of this goldsmith’s work, in February and then in April, in the presence of a blind film buff, Emmanuel Coutris, who shared his feelings on listening to the first draft of the writing. “Chantal Akerman strongly believed in the experience of the spectator’s body in the cinema. I totally agree with this idea”comments Marie Diagne.
For this film buff who runs workshops with all types of audiences, a visually impaired person is above all a cinema spectator, exploring the film with their “eyes from within” : “When you’re in a room, you feel a very physical space between the soundtrack and the image. If a spectator doesn’t have access to the image [parce qu’il est aveugle]there is something missing for him to be able to fully take his place in the room. This is where the words of the audio description come in.”, she says. And to add: “ The central question is: what is there in the image that the soundtrack alone does not allow us to perceive, and that it is essential to perceive in order to grasp the author’s cinematic project?
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