Charlevoix...

Just a word on Charlevoix

Incidentally Roy has worked quite enough with film directors who were most interested in the environmental beauty of Nature, that it seems to me appropriate to talk about the surroundings in which movies are being shot. Sometimes sites even become part of the characters, for example Montreal in Being at home with Claude or the St.Maurice region in Filles de Caleb.

Charlevoix is a mysterious country. Tucked in between the St.Lawrence river and the old mountains, between the great river and the worn out tops of the mountains. Charlevoix breath the air of Québec from the inside. It is an earthquake region. It is our California, our San Andreas fault. Enshrined between mountains, it sleeps quietly, far away from the noise of the big cities.

But Charlevoix knows how fragile she is, sitting on a deep tellurian fault and that is why the country offers the same extreme facets found in Alex’s character, being capable of the best and the worst.

People of Charlevoix are also very proud. No doubt, because of the beauty of the site and of the good life they find there. For instance, eating in Charlevoix will become a divine experience. No wonder that you will find such a scene in the movie where the Art of Food is so often celebrated giving you a double pleasure of the senses : visual and olfactory. And this without any extravaganza of expressive dining rooms : just a special attention on how to enjoy life.

This famous scene has been shot on two alternative plans. One without any faces, the camera being at the table level. All you see is the lower part of the bodies : the hips, the arms, hands and the food. Everyone busy preparing the meal. The second plan is american, where you see four characters being inter-active, Alex and Jean-Louis next to each other and using knives.

Sister Alfa, leaning against the wall, near Alex. Jeanne, the mother, is whipping cream. You hear the noise of the wooden spoon in the bowl. A deep, warm sound like the sound of love. Alex dips his finger in the cream, like he used to do when a child, but his mother will slap him gently reminding him to behave himself.

A light as pure as crystal enters the room. A perfect shot. A clear picture when light dances over the wine. You can hear the voice of wine floating down in the glasses, then waltzing from hand to hand. Alex is pouring that wine, filing up the glasses, touching lightly one partner and caressing an other, like a cat.

Then slowly with a sacred gesture, he takes out the roast from the oven, enjoying the beautiful smell. All of a sudden I felt like we were both experiencing a similar pleasure. With a little imagination we can assume that it is the only lamb roast that one had ever smell on the big screen !

Alex sharpens the cutting knife, and like an expert, he starts slicing the roast, depositing each hot and juicy slices on the carving board. And that’s beautiful because it is in the manner that even simple gestures are done. The same thing happens when he will present his sister a glass of wine, feeling the shape of the glass, sliding it between his fingers, the same way you would pick up a flower to smell its perfume.

Roy has the ability to relate to objects as well as to human being. With the same attention and care. I doubt if he ever learned to act like that, because it is so natural for him. He makes the world better. I would call this : a special gift of transmission. What a target for all of us. The world’s greatest injustice perhaps lies right there. Certain persons being so gifted to interact with life while others can do so little. But I feel that we must reach for that goal. To live better and leave in a state of grace; that is after having enjoyed life and our relations with others.

And to sum up this scene, we only hear his voice over the sound of the kitchen’s activities. Alex is dreaming and thinking aloud. But he is getting exasperated and brings an end to our ecstasy by sticking the knife in the board, and the blade sways. Alex has once again thrown us out of happiness.

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I believe that Alex’s talent to destroy was really bothering me. But it also has a charming side to it and that’s what gives the movie a certain rhythm. Without his presence, everything else would die out, but he revives them all the time. He builds up situations, shows the road, creates tensions, brushing off everything in his path and brings them back to him against their own will.

He shows them how to get to the zenith, to reach for the sky, calling the stars by their name, he listens to the galloping horse rushing in during a thunderstorm, his voice caressing the wild animal to calm him down. He gives life to this animal that only exist in his imagination and we all believe it is true. Alex and Roy are sharing this power.

Alex is showing them the river which will soon become the sea, he is talking about the present while dreaming of the future and at the same time reliving his childhood. Alex is a wonderful poet. He is an infant-man. Not caring about his behavior and going through life with an irrespectable sincerity. What finally had disturbed me most in his attitude was his dark void resting at the bottom of his soul. Just like Charlevoix’s fault, a terrifying abyss...