Champ de Bataille

Synopsis

 “ They called me to the 3rd North Trench. Gotta fix a phone line. Hurry up! It's blowing up everywhere. Miserable weather, Captain. Can't hear much anyway. Ears got blasted by a shell. This war’s a curse. I'm 20 and  don't even have a gun.”

The Earth carries all of mankind’s memories within it. But when people suffer, their pain and torment always rise to the surface. In 1916, the fields of Verdun were the theatre of unprecedented barbarism. Battered bodies, mutilated landscapes, darkened skies of despair... Amidst all this, a soldier named Julien lives through these dark times, abandoning any chance of youth and happiness. He, and the nature that surrounds him, are forever united in a common fate.

Director's note

Champ De Bataille (“Battlefield”) is an immersive experience in the heart of Verdun’s trenches in 1917, during a murderous offensive. While participating in a TV program on WWI, I had the opportunity to meet some of the war’s remaining first-hand participants. This was both a shock and an opportunity for me to delve into my own family roots, since my grandfather had fought in this war. It also allowed me a chance to explore my favourite theme: the human becoming. In 2016, I discovered another frontline as I watched my son venture into the intricacies of the video game, Battlefield 1 (by Electronic Arts). It's an impressive game, but it is devoid of what I consider to be an absolutely essential element: humanity – the inclination to be, to live, to feel something in one’s very flesh, and to fear for one’s life.

Champ De Bataille offers an emotional counterpoint to this kind of immersion, while highlighting the absurdity of war. Julien, our young hero, is fragile, near-deaf, and a stranger in a world whose meaning he no longer understands. He’s in charge of maintaining open lines of communication: a metaphor for the lost human connection between good and evil. In spite of himself, Julien allows his officers to reestablish contact, who then send men to their deaths. He’s not actively fighting, but he remains the target and devastated witness of this battlefield.

Champ De Bataille captures this devastation.

François Vautier, biography

Born in 1964, in Normandy, France.

After I Saw The Future (2017) and Recoding Entropia (2020), François Vautier returns to the Venice Film Festival for the third time with Champ de Bataille (2024). In this new opus, the director has experimented with live action VR to look at the absurdity of war and, by extension, the notions of fraternity and humanity. Vautier’s artistic vision explores the absolute and infinite – as well as their converse: the limits of space, time and human nature. His work has been screened at numerous international festivals and immersive museums in Paris, Amsterdam, Dubai, and New York.