Thomas Balmès: “In See you tomorrow on the Moon, we are more in the feeling than in the explanation”

The director of Babies – a global success in 2010 – makes a very strong documentary within a palliative care unit. How to find the right tone to talk about the end of life? Answers with the main interested party

See you tomorrow on the Moon takes us into the palliative care unit of Calais hospital. What was the first trigger that led you there?

A photo by photographer Jérémy Lempin. The photo of a horse at the bedside of a patient in this palliative care unit. An incredible image. As in most of my projects, the desire does not necessarily arise from a subject or a message to convey but from something which, visually, speaks to me and gives me the feeling that I could take on a story in a very visual way. This is what happened for HAS tomorrow on the Moon which I even envisaged a time entirely without dialogue

Would you define See you tomorrow on the Moon like a film about the end of life?

No because it’s not just that. In my eyes, it’s a film that speaks to everyone, whatever their age and state of health, around the idea of ​​trying to reconsider the time we have left and what we are going to do with it. Or what the central character of this film, Amandine, goes through when she learns at 36 that she only has a few months to live. Amandine has two children aged five and eight, and a husband her age. The film will follow her from the moment she learns of her illness until the end and will try to accompany her in the question which then becomes central for her: what to do with these last weeks, these last months?

How did you find Amadine and especially how did you convince her to let herself and her family film in those moments?

Having spent a few weeks in the palliative care unit and therefore seeing many people very close to the end, pushed me to rethink the film I had in mind. I thought it would be wiser to start it earlier, when the incurable side of the disease was announced. And it was the doctors I spoke with who told me about Amandine, who had just been diagnosed. I met her and, after thirty seconds, it was obvious to me. Basically, it wasn’t me who chose her but the other way around! Amandine has a very strong relationship with the representation of herself. She dreamed of making a film, of participating in TV games. When she learned that a documentary was being filmed in the hospital, she immediately expressed her desire to be part of it to leave a mark on her children. So they could see how she fought against the illness and who she was. And she was very proactive throughout the filming to the point of becoming the driving force behind a film which, as she says herself, helped and supported her through what she was going through. She totally upset the balance ofHAS tomorrow on the Moon : it was not at all initially planned for it to occupy such a central place.

How do you get yourself and your camera accepted in a palliative care center?

About 20 years ago, my father was hospitalized for back pain. And that day, a doctor took me aside and said to me: “Your father has pancreatic cancer, he has a few weeks, at most a few months left. » So I had already experienced what those around people hospitalized in this center go through. This constitutes an essential stone of the building. Then, on site, I explained in a very open way why I was there, what I wanted to do. I showed my films to patients and nursing staff. I talked for hours, days. Whole weeks can go by without taking the camera out, then one day you shoot for two minutes and you don’t come back two months later. That’s what’s extraordinary about documentaries: you can spread out the filming. Initially, the film was supposed to be made over a year, but ultimately we shot it over more than two years. You have to be extremely patient and talk much more than turn.

Was obtaining authorizations complicated?

There were obviously moments linked to medical confidentiality that we could not film. Families of patients refused to be at their side on certain days. But it seemed completely normal to me and it was a starting point for this project.

Besides Amandine, another character stands out as central to the story: Peyo, a horse who visits the most fragile patients to soothe them in their final days. He brings, from the first shot of the film where an atmosphere of magical realism emerges which contrasts with the coldness of the corridors of a hospital…

In my opinion, See you tomorrow on the Moon would not exist without this horse. Because it allows the film to open towards something totally dreamlike, as you point out. When it appears, you never know if it is reality or a dream. And this corresponds to the concrete effect that Peyo produces: when he enters the palliative care center, the energy completely changes, all the tensions ease. I like that we don’t really know what he’s doing there, that it remains mysterious.

It also tells what type of film you want to make. You refuse something too educational…

Yes, we are in the feeling more than in the explanation. Some spectators told me that they thought they were watching fiction. This is exactly what I’m working on: moving away from the television vision of the documentary. A genre of infinite richness. It can also be poetic, narrative, very close to fiction. This is why I always start without any preconceived ideas. Reality always takes me elsewhere.

How many of you are on set?

Between four to six people. But I am almost always alone with patients. This is essential for privacy. We use a camera with which James Cameron has just made Avatar and which he had made. A very heavy camera, with a very large sensor and cinema optics. And camera assistants take stock remotely so that I can be alone in the rooms and we can be as least intrusive as possible.

See you tomorrow on the Moon opens… with a Universal logo that you wouldn’t expect to see associated with this style of documentary. How did this happen?

Universal financed 100% of this project. They came for me while I was developing it on my own. And I owe this strong and unique bond with them to the enormous success that Babies known in the United States – I was even invited to talk about it on Oprah Winfrey’s set at the time! – and across the world. They have been by my side ever since and we had been in discussions for years about making a sequel to Babies when the idea ofHAS tomorrow on the Moon arose. And there is basically an echo between the two films: in BabiesI followed four human beings from their birth to their first steps; In See you tomorrow on the MoonI follow four human beings in the last weeks of their lives.

See you tomorrow on the Moon. By Thomas Balmès. Duration 1h20. Released February 4, 2026