Le Havre
Short description
Le Havre is a comedy-drama set in the French port city of the same name. Marcel Marx, a former writer who has long since given up on literary success, lives a contented life as a shoeshiner, dividing his time between his work, the local bar and his wife Arletty. His routine is disrupted when a young immigrant boy from Africa enters his life and his wife falls seriously ill. Marcel then takes it upon himself to shield the boy from the authorities, who want to deport him, relying on his own optimism and the support of his neighbours.
Aki Kaurismäki directed the film and wrote the screenplay; he also produced it. It is the eighth of the eleven features listed among his directorial credits, arriving between To Each His Own Cinema and Dirty Hands, and follows the deadpan style and working-class settings familiar from his earlier films. André Wilms plays Marcel, with Kati Outinen as Arletty, Jean-Pierre Darroussin as Monet, Blondin Miguel as Idrissa, Elina Salo as Claire and Evelyne Didi as Yvette. Sixty-four cast members are credited.
Produced across Germany, Finland and France with a budget of four million dollars, the film took roughly the same amount at the worldwide box office. On IMDb, the audience rating stands at 7 out of 10 from 492 votes, while a critics' rating of 7.8 out of 10 is based on 98 reviews, a notably warmer response than that of general viewers.
What's left behind the scenes
- In 2012, Finland submitted this film for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
- The idea for the film originated with the director three years before the start of direct work on the project. The screenplay was written in the summer of 2009, and filming took place from March 23 to May 12, 2010.
- The character of Marcel Marx received his surname in honor of Karl Marx. His wife Arletty and the doctor Becker were named after icons of French cinema, Arletty and Jacques Becker.
- "Le Havre" is the first film by Finnish director Aki Kaurismäki in French. At the same time, he had already filmed in France before. Two decades earlier, the shooting of the film "La Vie de Bohème" (1992) took place there.
- The film's director, Aki Kaurismäki, believed that a similar story could have happened in almost any European country. In search of a suitable location for filming, he drove along the coast of almost all of Western Europe from Genoa to the Netherlands, eventually choosing Le Havre.
- Director Aki Kaurismäki is a big fan of strong drinks. During filming, he devised a rule for the actors and crew: after every hundred frames, everyone was entitled to a glass of Calvados, a popular apple brandy in the area.
- A Finnish film fund covered a fifth of the film's budget.
- The film 'Le Havre' marked Kati Outinen’s tenth acting role in Aki Kaurismäki’s films. She first appeared in one of his films in 1987 in the comedy 'Hamlet Goes Business'.
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
