“Almost” is the story of an unlikely friendship between a handicapped quadra and an undertaker. This comedy, played by Alexandre Jollien and Bernard Campan, addresses disability with humor to break taboos. In theaters January 26, 2022.
Pair Alexandra Del Peral
“We started from what we are to make a fiction.” Gathered for the first time on screen and in directing, the actor Bernard Campan and the philosopher Alexandre Jollien deliver in “Almost“a road movie regarding friendship and the quest for self (trailer opposite), in theaters on January 26, 2022.
Acting: exposing yourself to criticism
It all started from a common desire, there is that “several years“, confide the two accomplices, during an interview with theAFP. From this desire was born “Almost“, the sixth feature film by the former member of Unknown, legendary trio of the 1990s who will soon reform for a film. “We took a long time to embark on the project because Alexandre wanted to take the risk of playing. And acting means exposing yourself to criticism and judgment“, explains Bernard Campan.
A youth in a specialized institution
Alexandre is Alexandre Jollien, 46, a successful Swiss author born with cerebral palsy following a strangulation by the umbilical cord in his mother’s womb. His first book, praise of weakness, where he recounts his journey towards philosophy and criticizes the banishment of people with disabilities in specialized institutions – where he himself lived from the age of 3 to 20 – revealed it to the general public. It was also during a television appearance that Bernard Campan discovered him and made contact with him. From this meeting will be born their friendship. In 2007, he worked on the script for the film The dark side, directed by the former actor of Unknown. “I was on a script that was giving me problems and Alexandre helped me. He reached out his hand and never let go“, recalls Bernard Campan.
Break taboos with humor
In Almost -his first role in the cinema-, Alexandre Jollien interprets Igor, a quadra handicapped and fond of philosophy. To earn a living, he delivers organic vegetables by bicycle. But fate makes him cross paths with Louis (Bernard Campan), an undertaker who takes him on a journey from Lausanne to the south of France. Friendship, death, disability, sex, the gaze of others… the film, stuffed with sequence shots as if to allow the viewer to travel with the two actors, seizes, without taboo, tough subjects that it treats with great of humor. A fiction largely inspired by their own history. “When Alexandre had this idea, namely to leave us, what made our friendship, I said to myself that it was obvious. Starting from what we are to make a fiction, it’s just jubilant“, details Bernard Campan. “Friendship, perhaps more than the couple, is a philosophy. It’s unconditional love and it’s perfecting together at any age. A perfect theme for a movie!“, enthuses the philosopher.
Denounce the permanent judgment
Not just an ode to improbable friendships, the film also denounces a society of permanent judgment, where difference remains scrutinized, sometimes mocked, and calls for ignoring the gaze of others, in order to live better. “We wanted to take a step aside to look at things calmly, serenely, and not be in the conditioning in which we all live, to have an immediate opinion on everything. And that goes once morest the times we live in“, argues Bernard Campan. “It’s also a film that talks regarding the inner life. If it can make people want to turn their gaze back on themselves and get out of preconceived ideas regarding others, that will already be quite a lot.“, abounds the writer. Disarmingly natural on the screen, Alexandre Jollien confides, however, that his first acting experience was not easy. “Receiving directives, injunctions, it brought back things from my childhood… Still, the fact of having been directed by a friend is an incredible experience“.
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