Annecy 2025 – Michel Gondry: “Today, everything is based on proven recipes” (interview)

Guest of honor at the Annecy festival, the director confides in animation, Hollywood and his next film which will shoot towards horror.

Big news for Michel Gondry: a crystal of honor and a masterclass at the Annecy festival, a retrospective at the Cinémathèque and the release on June 18 of his new film, Maya, give me another title (Stop motion animation based on the stories told to him by his daughter. A way to keep the link even if they live in two different countries). This deserved a meeting under the sun of the Venice of the Alps.

First: your films Maya, give me a title and its “suite” Maya, give me another titledo you do them thinking of the public or only of your daughter?
Michel Gondry: Basically, these are films that I was simply making for my daughter. She was three years old at the start and it was her adventure since she was represented in it. It was simply for her to just color drawings then, little by little, the images came to life. And then, growing up, we started to communicate better. She gave me ideas for titles, little stories … But we never thought it would end on a big screen, even less in Annecy! It all spread out from three years to his nine years. Much later, in 2019, I said to myself: ” Here, why not bring them together to make a film? »»

And you even made him participate in the promotion.
Yes. There, she could not be in Annecy because of the school, but in Paris, we did a lot of interviews together. She is lively, she responds very well to journalists, she is not at all shy. During questions and answers, she even brought the microphone to the public. Sometimes she said she couldn’t answer because she was too small at the time to remember. This is where we realize that there is a whole part of our lives, of which we only keep fuzzy traces – except that we do not have the films to remember.

Yesterday during your masterclass, You said that the animation in summary images involving deadlines that are too important for you to get started.
Yes, this is a real problem. Especially with the special effects today. At the start, in the 80s, we worked with digital systems that made it possible to control everything, layer by layer. It was a live job, we saw things being done. Today, we show you an already almost final rendering, and if you want to change, it’s very heavy. I like digital, and my brother with whom I work uses it a lot. Besides, we made a duet clip for the Idles group: me with cut paper, him in 3D post-production. But I want to keep a certain spontaneity.

Do you need to keep this homemade, artisanal spirit?
Not necessarily. What I like is the pace and immediacy of manual work. It could be digital, as long as it keeps this energy. What bothers me is to see digital animations that clumsily copy manual techniques – like the false trembling effects to simulate the old -fashioned cartoon. It’s artificial. If a character does not move, he does not move. No need to make him vibrate. The “tinkered” side as journalists often say is not a goal in itself. I’m not trying to crado! The traces of glue that we see on the screen sometimes disturb me, but they are there for practical reasons. It is not a desired aesthetic. It is a side effect of the process, and that I assume. Like when I was doing Be nice, rewind And that I asked the decorators to create decorations that were to seem made by clumsy characters: it is not easy to obtain, this natural false. It must be sincerely clumsy. Like the actors: when they had to play badly for the needs of the film, like Jack Black and Mos Def in this case, I told them by laughing to play well, because it will be pretty bad like that! (Laughter.)

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Are your very powerful images of images sometimes sometimes a kind of trap? Do you never want to get out to go towards something more square?
Not really. Even with more means, I would keep a physical side. Look The Magician of Oz And his painted sets, we see that it is false, but that makes you dream. We imagine people on ladders, painting mountains. This mixture of reality and painted, matter and perspective, it moves me. When I go to the New York Natural History Museum, I systematically dwell on these dioramas where stocked animals are staged, with real objects in the foreground and painted funds. It has always fascinated me. It’s not DIY, it’s magic.

You also talked yesterday problems you encountered on large productions …
The concern is that there are too many intermediaries, too many production layers. The projects go through so many hands that on arrival we try to please everyone, and it kills interest. And then today, everything is based on proven recipes, especially with superheroes. It becomes very predictable. But I would like to make a film with big sets, effects, something really spectacular.

Could we imagine seeing you work on a film on a modest budget but in an unexpected genre? Like a thriller or a horror film?
It’s fun that you said that, because this is the case with the film I am writing right now. I am finishing the scenario, the casting started. It will be a French production and it is, at the base, a horror film. He starts like this: two little girls find a skull in their garden. Not bad, as a starting point (Laughter.)

What did you feel when you learn that the Annecy festival made you its guest of honor?
It touched me, sincerely. I have always felt a little on the sidelines of the world of animation. Surely because my work is simpler, less technical than many others. I lead in 12 images/second, while some people think that the animation must be jerky to be “authentic”. I am not part of the closed circle, so this price really makes me happy.

You have long dreamed of a movie Ubikthe novel by Philip K. Dick. Wouldn’t animation be a way to get there, rather than real shots?
Yes and no. There was an attempt to adapt from K. Dick by Richard Linklater, to scan Darkly, in rotoscopy. And it was very successful: there was something that recalled Blade Runner, models, textured atmospheres. But it’s very hard to finance. This kind of universe, bushy, costs extremely expensive. And if we simplify too much, then we damage everything.