Rituel 4 : Le Grand Débat

Since 2015, stage director Emilie Rousset and film director Louise Hémon create the series “Rituals”, an evolving collection of performances and films examining the rituals of our society, playing with the codes of theater and documentary cinema. Fourth collaboration “The Big Debate” recreates a televised debate of presidential runoff election, written as a cut-up from archives of the debates of 1974 to 2017. The set device and codes of live broadcasting are restaged. Around a table, two actors face to face, Emmanuelle Lafon and Laurent Poitrenaux, replay these fragments in front of the audience and cameras. Edited live, the film is screened above the actor as they act.This final debate, mixing rhetoric and adrenaline, has its own filmic language, editing principles, set design and media history.With these highly codified rules, this event is a true modern ritual. But is it a ritual of democracy or television? The border is hazy.