Awards and Achievements
After 95 minutes of murders, cynicism, Belgium, beer, rape and humor, the credits finally scroll on the screen in the small room in Cannes. The lights come back on. The small room empties very quickly. The spectators who come out that day are very divided.
But very quickly, the film rose to the rank of phenomenon at Cannes 1992. The three young Belgians held interviews, meetings with buyers, directors and actors. They are propelled without warning into the great world of cinema. “It happened close to you“won three awards and made the headlines in Belgium.
In Cannes, the film finds a distributor. It comes out in Belgium in August. And there too it is a real phenomenon. Everybody talks regarding it. For French-speaking Belgians, the shock is even greater. The filming locations, the accents, the production close to the Strip-Tease show, the identification with the murderer work at full speed.
“It happened close to you“marks a break, a revolution for Belgian cinema. A short film created outside of all the traditional networks touches its audience and marks a generation.
Posterity of “It Happened”
For Hugues Dayez, RTBF film journalist, the film has made small: “A cinema like that of Gustave Kerven and Benoit Delépine with their alternative cinema tried to develop a kind of irreverence. The film left traces. But you have to realize that it’s a happy accident, it’s a non-reproducible film. The only thing that emerged from the film is nature, it’s Benoit Poelvoorde.
You should know that Benoit Poelvoorde was the only one not to make movies in the trio. Yet he is the only one who made it followingwards. It is a paradox. Benoît Poelvoorde is the first Belgian actor who can impose his nationality in French cinema. Until then, the actors or actresses said at best that they came from the North to be part of the great family of French cinema. In the wake of Poelvoorde, actors like François Damiens or Olivier Gourmet were able to break through. The rise of Belgian cinema is the rise of Belgian actors”.
