Filming the France Télévisions show “Germinal” – which plays in the TV Series Competition of this week’s– felt a lot like leading a band of rebels in an uprising against the old guard, says cinematographer Xavier Dolléans.
This production, co-produced by Banijay Studios France and Pictanovo, was directed by David Hourrègue, building on his success with a French adaptation of youth-skewing drama “Skam.” Julien Lilti is the “Germinal” creator and writer. Capturing the look and the mood of the miners was important to the DP, he says. “They are very happy and very proud,” he explains, despite a life of incredible hardship. “That’s a bit strange, actually. But you can still feel it in northern France – that was a huge area of mining.”
The owners and profiteers of the mines live in a different world, of course. “For the bourgeoisie I did a very soft, more static, warm look,” generally shot on a locked-off tripod. When in the mines, the camera is handheld on a crane or a Steadicam, suggesting a world of menace and the unknown lurking just out of frame.
The third world the production captured was the most challenging – that of the miners trapped in an underground flood. “For three days we had only underwater shooting,” Dolléans recalls. “This is really difficult.” And in scenes depicting the standoff between the rich and powerful and the miners, he says, “We shot it like a Western.”
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