The Perpetual Leek

Alain is getting older. For years he has been filming his daily life: his partner Françoise, the people he meets, nature and animals, and life in all its splendour and cruelty. Having devoted his entire life to filmmaking, with the camera as an extension of his arm, he has observed the world with a poetic sense of authenticity and simplicity. Otherness, the approach of death, the power of life and the importance of others intertwine as he looks back on his life as a filmmaker and as a man, concealing nothing, and offering a vision of the universality of the human experience.

In her debut feature, Alexandra Pianelli captures the unique world in and around her family’s Paris newsstand, presenting a film diary that lovingly documents her time working there. Sequestered behind the cramped counter, Pianelli films the world as it passes before her with a boundless sense of curiosity and compassion. iPhone or GoPro strategically set up before her, she records idiosyncratic interactions with charming regulars who drop by for their newspapers and a chat, or the lost passers-by simply looking for directions. Le Kiosque is a tender study of humanity, as well as a bittersweet sketch of physical media’s dying days as the newsstand’s future becomes increasingly unclear.

“When I was a child, they found I had a giant S-shaped scoliosis of the spine and a large angioma of the left brain. These conditions prevented my carrying anything heavy and gave me ophthalmic migraines. Under pressure, I started to draw. Later, when I rediscovered these drawings, I decided to make a film all by myself, with no crew and as little gear as possible in order not to overburden my back. I spent five years harvesting images, assembling, erasing and ordering them to tell this tale of one little woman and soulmates: a tale that has become my way of handling the spokes in my wheel. Over the years, I have learnt to reach out and share my experiences with humour.” Zoé Chantre