Up-and-coming French director Sophie Caretta takes us on a lyrical journey through her creative soul. From assisting on City of Lost Children to cinematography via ceramics and architecture, Sophie’s travels (which also saw her living in Argentina and Italy) eventually led her to US production house Identity, where she recently signed as a commercials director.
What drew you to filmmaking?
It was surely the desire to tell stories, a story unto itself and outside of time, my own or that of another’s. Each shoot brings forth some life force; it’s a little bit of my own life that I share through these stories…
What interests me is not so much the act of telling, but rather the challenge that consists in discovering a universal emotion that each of us has inside us.
I love the anticipation of the magic moment like a kind of spark, a trick of the light, the out of the ordinary, the surprise of an unexpected emotion, the look that speaks miles…
It’s the desire to learn and discover more that has certainly pushed me into working as a filmmaker.
Right now, the advertising world is a wonderful ”playground” for a filmmaker whose childhood reveries persist through their work. I like the idea of working on a variety of projects as long as I can bring my everyday sense of humor and personal poetry into it. The challenge is to find the emotion that rings true.
When and why did you decide to make the jump from cinematographer to director? What was the process like?
It all began so long ago with a curious desire to make a super 8 film when I was seven years old! But it wasn’t until later, when I was at school at F.E.M.I.S. (a well-known film school in Paris) that I really moved towards working as a director.
Primarily guided by the acuity of my vision, it was working on short films and documentaries that led me into directing. I needed to learn that the image was the most important thing; it was crucial for me to be at the heart of the action, working closely with directors and seeing what their aesthetic concerns were.
I had the good fortune to work on some very aesthetically ambitious films and with some very compelling and meticulous directors…
The dream of directing, that we carry around with us for a long time before ever acting it out, became a reality with the help of a producer who got me into working on advertising films in 2008. His unwavering support, which was tested time and again, allowed me to begin to tackle a new kind of cinema with its own particular visual language.
The transition from cinematographer to director was never so much distressing as it was a real necessity in order to tell a story. More recently I have discovered directing to be an outlet via which I can explore my own curiosities and interests.
I also enjoy working collaboratively with so many talented people from all different parts of the world, using the scripts as a marvelous trampoline for my imagination.
You’ve studied architecture and you are also into ceramics and photography… How do these other creative pursuits influence/feed into your directing? And where do you think your compulsive creativity comes from?
All of my studies in architecture, photography, ceramics and clothing design are all undeniably related to one another through a single driving force. The vestiges of my experimentation in these other crafts permeate my work in film and I think is heavily influenced by my own personal history, my time abroad and my cosmopolitan experience…
I really like the idea that I can draw up a plan for the construction of a set or the pattern for a piece of clothing to make a costume, take photographs to rediscover a space, direct actors in their own languages…
The research that goes into choosing just the right materials, colors is often the same across different mediums.
I have always loved to juggle different means of expressing myself. It might seem like an insatiable curiosity for all different kinds of savoir faire but most of the time the skills acquired can easily be transposed from one medium into another.
That being said, the most trivial things inspire me: I can be taken by the smoothness of a beautiful ceramic piece, rave about the sensuality of the curve of the nape of the neck, the fold in a translucent dress, the delicate movements of a hand… I film privilege, fantasy, evanescence, the improbable or the beautiful… Whatever it might be, I always look for the emotion in it.
What do you think you learned from working on feature on feature films like city of lost children? And what was it like working on such a visually creative film?
The “City of Lost Children” was one of my first films working as assistant camera. I was fascinated by the audacity of the film. It was like going to see a show every day and every night I would go home starry eyed.
A film so rich necessarily leaves a deep impression, as if branded into you. I took away from that film the carefulness and devotion that the two directors put into it, always prioritizing the film’s aesthetic—a stylized and finished look, with sets that took your breath away. The shooting of the film was a true lesson in cinema and its own brand of magic… It really turned my world upside down—it’s where I met my husband with whom I now share my passion for film !
What are your ambitions as a director?
I try to keep in close collaboration with my subconscious, which I consider richer and freer than my everyday, waking mind.
No experience is overlooked, and with each new opportunity I become an avid emotional predator. Storytelling is what gives meaning to what I do. My greatest ambition would be to make a full-length feature and allow my imagination to run free!
Which piece of your directing work are you most proud of and why?
I’m really proud of my first promotional film, “Career Builder”. It has the freshness of the work of a beginning filmmaker—spontaneous with a liberty in its tone that never ceases to surprise me.
The message of the work is also a subject I hold close to my heart: “Don’t forget your childhood dreams, anything is possible!”
Check out Sophie’s full reel at Identityid.com
