Lean on the Wall (2021)

• 80%
• 2021
• Documentary
• Jacques Meilleurat

The well-seasoned film-maker Jacques Meilleurat has always been discreet, making films at a modest pace on a shoestring. His latest opus stages this financial necessity - in the supposed beginning, there is an old fictitious contract signed with a publisher to tell the story of a life scarred by sexual abuse. This diary is dictated into an old-fashioned cassette recorder. That is what the film depicts. « Bernard », the protagonist's name, is played by the director. He tells the story, his story and takes poses. Sitting, lying down, standing up, 'leaning against a wall', but also dancing as though he's possessed. He also interleaves a handful of film excerpts, made so long ago, which are so crucial here and which evoke fishes characters who are extremely disturbed and who are also crucial here. Short, airy, home-made films cobbled together in the same vein as Méliès or the surrealists, films out of step with what the camera has to offer today. However, if the violence of his remarks continually goes from bad to worse, as for the film - it rolls downhill, peppered with surprises. You'd think you were in hell and on a rollercoaster at that, almost without moving the frame Meilleurat whisks us along on this endlessly bumpy ride. It's as if he is performing the lamento non-stop and it is a formalist who emerges, a formalist who is passionate about his art, its possibilities, disparities and complete and utter liberty. If Meilleurat leans against a wall it is, of course, in order to do better and aim higher still - onwards upwards and skywards.