PROFILS PAYSANS: LA VIE MODERNE

The third episode in a series devoted to farm-workers in the French highlands, La Vie moderne revisits several of the characters introduced in the preceding films. A reflection on the possibilities for development of this vanishing trade, Depardon's plans fixes capture the faces and gestures of these men and women seemingly from another era. Caught in all their intimacy, these profiles of peasants, both solemn and frivolous, taciturn and expansive, bear witness to a history without a future. Coming himself from a family of farmers, Depardon took his time before daring to examine his own roots. With La Vie moderne, he continues the sensitive work of ethnographic filmmaking that he began seven years earlier.