Brigitte Sy
Born 1956, Paris. She is an actress and director. As an actress, she appeared in several feature films directed by Philippe Garrel: LIBERTY AT NIGHT (LIBERTÉ, LA NUIT, 1984); EMERGENCY KISSES (LES BAISERS DE SECOURS, 1989); I CAN NO LONGER HEAR THE GUITAR (J’ENTENDS PLUS LA GUITARE, 1991); REGULAR LOVERS (LES AMANTS RÉGULIERS, 2005). In 2008 she made her debut fiction short film as a director, THE BEST PLACE (L’ENDROIT IDÉAL), followed in 1999 by the documentary short film FRUITS DE MER. In 2009 she directed her first feature film, FREE HANDS (LES MAINS LIBRES). ASTRAGALUS is her second feature film as a director.
Director’s statement
«I spent a quarter of my life in prison, I moved to juvenile court, correctional, Assises, I fought, I sighed, I laughed; also I know deep in my certainty that under the tangled bushel of rock and scrap metal, sleepless nights and gray hours, there is always one day, a way back...» A.S.
“When very young I read ‘Astragal’, I must have felt my destiny would be tied, though not exactly like Albertine Sarrazin’s, to prison.
“It’s possible that in my distant nights, I dreamed of being Albertine, long before walking myself on the other side of the wall. Or maybe I dreamed that this royal and mischievous woman, gentle and violent, ironic, intellectual, sensual and tender, aggressive and determined, was my mother.
“ASTRAGAL is the story of a passionate love: from a 20 years old young girl to a man who took her in, wounded, at the foot of the prison wall she just escaped one night of April 1957. Albertine’s escape will end in June 1958 with her arrest in Paris.
The action of my movie is set between these two dates.
“ASTRAGAL is an extraordinary story, through the miraculous encounter between Albertine and Julien, intensified by their obstacles to be together.
“Thanks to him, she walks again. She suffers from her physical injury but it’s mostly from love that she aches.
“It’s also the portrait of a young woman whose passion for extreme, love of freedom and exhilaration of youth make her an eternally modern heroine. Albertine doesn’t belong to anything, she belongs to herself. She is her world, her land, her own planet. A planet on fire that will explode later in full flight.
“On the run, and in a war against everything that hampers her at the time when Algeria is running with fire and blood, when the first attacks occur in France and when the National Liberation Front hunt is launched. Albertine, born in Algeria, abandoned then adopted by a French couple, ‘ignores’ her North African origins. She walks the streets of Paris and runs throughout France. Wanted, every minute of freedom may be the last, every frown threatens her of a treason.
“If her extraordinary ability to believe she is indestructible preserves her from the dangers that threaten her, it’s mostly her indomitable need to write that saves her. Writing is Albertine’s skin. To reach her in her body and soul, it would have been necessary to prevent her from writing.
“This run, the prostitution, the loneliness, the wait, the risks taken, it’s a way to keep living while waiting to find Julien. All things considered, the end of the film, at the moment of their radical separation, is the true beginning of their great love story, as Albertine wrote, ‘without land, without home’.
“Recently I was listening to a philosopher on the radio quoting another. ‘There is no explanation for love’, this is obvious, but when he added ‘We do not love someone because of its qualities, but it’s because we love this person that we find qualities’, he enlightened my whole day...”.