Il y a quelques années, j’ai réalisé un documentaire autour du réalisateur Jean Louis Van Belle. Débuté comme une interview lors d’une rétrospective à l’Etrange festival de Lyon, où il était juste question de poser quelques questions à ce cinéaste excentrique (qui avant le clap déclare ne pas souhaiter qu’apparaisse sa tête à l’image !), le projet s’est étendu pour devenir un documentaire à part entière d’une demi-heure, produit par le studio Gühmes, qui s’est retrouvé comme supplément d’une sortie vidéo de deux films du cinéaste : Le Sadique aux Dents Rouges & Paris Interdit, sous le prestigieux label anglo-saxon Mondo Macabro. Pour l’anecdote, c’est durant la rétro au festival que Pete Tombs, fondateur de Mondo Macabro, découvrit le travail de Jean Louis Van Belle. Il est désormais visible ci-dessous, avec l’aimable autorisation du Studio Gühmes.

Réalisateur français culte de plusieurs films atypiques des années 60 et 70, Jean Louis Van Belle revoit ses films ressortir dans divers festivals et cinémathèques. Cependant, peut-on dire qui se cache vraiment derrière le père de Paris Interdit et du Sadique aux dents Rouges ? Une plongée dans la vie de ce personnage qui tente de donner des pistes de lecture sur sa véritable personnalité…

Réalisation : Peter Van Lyris (Sylvain Perret)

Production : Oscar Cigar’ (Barthelemy Antoine-Loeff)

Images : Peter Van Lyris – Charles Dubois – Oscar Cigar’ – Paul de Bufa

Avec :  Michel Barbey, Christophe Bier, Nathalie Perrey, Jean-FrançOis Rauger, Denyse Roland, Jean-Louis Van Belle, Michel Anderson

Habillage : Paul de Bufa

Mixage son : Charles Dubois

30 Minutes. Format 1.85. Stéréo. 2009.

LA PRESSE EN PARLE

…A much-needed documentary… :: TwitchFilms.net

There’s a great French language documentary about Van Belle, which centers on this enigmatic directors propensity for storytelling and obscuring the truth of his own biography. Liner notes from Christophe Bier, who is also interviewed in the docu, do their best to separate fact from fiction but ends up emphasizing the unknowability of this unique figure in European low budget cinema. :: World Weird Cinema

Jean Louis van Belle proves to be a curious subject, as he introduces himself to a French audience in the third person (claiming that he’s not in fact van Belle, but that he’s worked closely with him) as the camera crops out his head for most of the running time. Towards the end, a camera zooms out to reveal van Belle’s face, sitting in front of a monitor, as he’s asked by an interviewer to respond to what others have just said about him. :: DVD Drive-in.com

Who is JLVB? (30m:14s) is mixed bag of a film by Peter Van Lyris, an oddly framed mishmash of interviews with former cast/crew of Van Belle, as well as a few words from the man himself during a presentation at what appears to have been a film festival. :: DigitallyOBSESSED.com

Incorporating scenes from his various films and relying on both on-camera testimonials from those who know him and from the cagey, somewhat unreliable Van Belle himself (who appears photographed only from the neck down), the short subject attempts to put the filmmaker into a Dadaist perspective (…) A self-described orphan who taught himself out of loneliness to tell stories, a failed seminarian and “a guy who barely went to school, a guy who knew nothing, with no diploma and not knowing anyone at all” who went on to make “a bunch of movies,” Van Belle agrees with the consensus that it was the making of his films and not the end result that was most rewarding. “I made films because I wanted to gather friends around me. Like at school or the orphanage and go off and have adventures in the world of cinema.” :: Turner Classic Movies.com