Bannec. On an island where winter storms wipe out all forms of life, four men come in two teams to spend the summer collecting seaweed in total isolation…
I was going to headline with Ultima Thule but that’s just
daft so I thought I’d link back or rather forward to Michael Powell’s brilliant
depiction of life on a remote Scottish island as seen and described a few weeks
back. Islands, it seems, you just cannot get enough especially if they face the
roaring uncertainty of the Atlantic and concern the relationship between the
families and the fisherman, the island and the mainland. I don’t know if Powell
saw this film or, indeed, Michael Flaherty before his trip to the Irish Arran,
but I wouldn’t be surprised.
Presented on Blu-ray for the very first time in the UK
and North America, and sourced from an astounding 4K restoration Jean Epstein’s
film is one of the silent elite, an almost documentarian approach that still
manages to bring plenty of human interest from the mix of locals and
professional actors. Does that sound familiar? It may do but we should never
take for granted the achievements of shooting in these unforgiving places and
in conditions that threatened more than just the shooting schedule.
Epstein was a writer on film and a film theorist as well as a director and with his third film, Coeur fidèle (1923), he experimented with a deceptively simple story of love and violence "a melodrama so
stripped of all the conventions ordinarily attached to the genre, so sober, so
simple, that it might approach the nobility and excellence of tragedy".1
His most famous film, La Chute de la maison Usher (1928)
was more typical of the French Impressionist school of film, with Henri
Langlois calling it “the cinematic equivalent of Debussy's works…”. By 1929 the director wanted to present reality in its most cinematic form, mixing documentary discipline with impressionist technique to stunning effect.
In her excellent video essay on this disc, film writer
Pamela Hutchinson explains Epstein’s use of the concept of “Photogénie” which
is essentially the use of cinematic technique to make the everyday
extraordinary on screen: the creation of what we’d perhaps call “pure cinema”.
There’s a lot of theoretical detail around this term and the director did not
coin the term but it certainly featured in his work and in this film
especially.
Finis Terrae is the first of the director’s Breton
trilogy, and was shot entirely on location off the Finistère coast in the part
of France we Angles and Celts often forget projects far into the Atlantic Ocean…
No channel or Irish or North Sea to ease the traveller into the thrashing ocean…
this is the highway to halibut and four men very much alone with their cod.
Epstein places his characters very much in their surroundings and they’re
dominated by the landscapes, often viewed from behind rocks or from overhead. They
are dramatically reduced in human significance against the terrible beauty of
the earth and sea.
 |
| There goes the wine |
Epstein chose to cast local seaweed harvesters rather than professional actors, giving the performances a raw, authentic quality and an ethnographic sense of documentary realism with the aid of sophisticated cutting. Epstein is concerned with time and there are frequent examples of his mixing up real-time action with slow-motion cut-aways sometimes involving symbolic moments. One such instance is when one of the four men on the island of Bannec, Ambroise Rouzic - the characters do not have names - drops their last bottle of wine and we see the anguished reaction of his mate, Jean-Marie Laot, and then cut repeatedly to the broken bottle spilling the precious fluid onto the sand. As it slowly drains into the ground tempers flare as a knife goes missing and the split that drives the rest of the narrative begins.
Ambroise has cut his finger and this very quickly becomes
infected which, in a time before anti-biotics is bad enough but they are miles
from the nearest doctor. He gradually loses his strength but having fallen out
of favour with the others they leave him be as he falls sick and they carry on
harvesting the seaweed, pushing into pits and burning it to create kelp which
was used for its iodine.
Gradually Jean-Marie’s character realises that his pal is
in trouble, after seeing him trying to get off the island on his own – an
impossibility given there’s no wind and he’d need two hands to paddle his way,
He falls unconscious on the sand and, finally they see how sick he is. Meanwhile
those on the mainland have noticed the absence of smoke from the island and
they make their way to the doctor to get him to go and help.
 |
| Jean-Marie Laot and Ambroise Rouzic |
With fierce currents around the coast and no wind, can the mainlanders and/or the men find each other in the treacherous middle. It’s a simple story but a powerful one and the outcome is far from certain creating a tense finale in which Epstein also manages to pick up the nuances of his untrained cast on land and sea.
There’s a poignant new score from Roch Havert which,
using a small ensemble comprising brass, woodwind and strings, provides a
sympathetic score which matches the visuals with understated jazz and modern
composition which allows the full flavours of the original material to play
out. Havert is an experienced composer and musician who has written a number of
scores, this one greatly enhances the film and brings a humble sincerity to the
enterprise as befits its ethnographic vitality.
A masterful score for a Master of Cinema. Buy it now and
if you need any more persuasion, here are the especially salty extra features:
·
Finis Terrae presented in 1080p HD from a
4K restoration by Gaumont Film Company
·
Optional English subtitles
·
Impressions on Jean Epstein – new
interview with film historian and critic Pamela Hutchinson on the life and work
of the director
·
Stranded – a new video essay on Finis
Terrae
·
The Bottom of the Wave – an archival
appreciation of Finis Terrae by Joel Daire
·
Limited Edition of 2,000 copies
·
Limited edition O-card slipcase featuring new
artwork by John Dunn
·
Limited edition collector’s booklet featuring a
new essay on Finis Terrae by Jean Epstein expert Christophe Wall-Romana
and archival writing by the director
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