Graffiti, Suicides, Most Beautiful Village

The small Belgian community of Vitrival, with a population of around 1,500, finds itself with a much higher profile these days. That is courtesy of Vitrival — The Most Beautiful Village in the World, the debut feature from Belgian writers-directors Noëlle Bastin, who grew up there, and Baptiste Bogaert. If you wonder what to expect, well, the movie, which world premiered at the Rotterdam Film Festival earlier this year, doesn’t fit neatly into traditional cinematic categories.

Is it comedic? Definitely, as its depictions of small-town life in a real-life Belgian village will make you chuckle. Does it have dramatic elements? For sure, given a wave of suicides that plagues the village. Does it provide a healthy serving of slice of life? Yes. After all, it follows two police officers, who are cousins, driving around and interacting with other inhabitants. Does it mix reality and fiction? Totally. Among other things, key roles in the film are portrayed by real-life inhabitants of the village, including members of Bastin’s family.

But the filmmakers aren’t too concerned with classifications. “For us, it’s just life,” Bogaert tells THR. “You can cry in the morning and you can laugh in the afternoon.” In fact, focusing too much on old genre labels could prove a disservice to film fans. Some audiences who come expecting a pure comedy may actually end up “a bit disappointed because it’s not all that funny,” argues Bogaert. “There are funny parts in it, but it’s not a ‘ha ha ha’ movie all the way.”

ND Pictures has just taken the movie for the Benelux region, with a theatrical release set for Nov. 12.

Now, Vitrival, a Naoko Films production, is getting its Asian premiere in the main competition program of the 15th edition of the Beijing International Film Festival on Tuesday, which the filmmakers both find “exciting.”

On their first-ever trip outside of Europe, they look forward to seeing how audiences react to their story set in Belgium. “I’m really curious, especially if the audience will laugh,” Bastin tells THR. “We don’t know how the audience will react, because we don’t have any idea of the cultural differences,” adds Bogaert.

Still, the Beijing stop on the film festival circuit means that Vitrival gets to play on a big stage and showcase its titular village far beyond Belgium’s borders.

How about a screening of the movie in the village itself? “Unfortunately, it has not happened yet. It will go there soon, but not yet,” Bastin tells THR. “But some of the people from the village came to Rotterdam.”

The group of around 20 included the people portraying the main characters and Bastin’s parents, aunts, and cousins. “It was a big delegation,” says Bogaert, who grew up nearby, with a laugh. And their reaction was positive. “They really enjoyed it,” shares Bastin. “They thought it was a good picture. Since they are from the village, they were laughing about a lot to small details.”

But a series of mysterious suicides, and the repeated appearance of graffiti depicting a certain male body part on houses and even a church, didn’t draw much attention from the locals. “We thought it was a bit strange that they didn’t focus at all on the suicide part,” recalls Bastin, concluding that they were more curious to see their hometown and life depicted on screen.

The suicides were an element that was one of the original drivers behind the project, as the filmmaker duo and real-life couple initially thought about adapting a novel about a wave of suicides before going in a different direction. “It was an interesting topic for us,” Bastin tells THR. Adds Bogaert: “One of the things that interested us was that suicide is a personal issue. But when more individuals die this way, it becomes more sociological. However, you don’t have a real clue why in the film. So you have to observe the environment, the gestures, the world, and the behaviors. You are put in a position where you must look at how this kind of thing is possible in this calm village.”

As observers, the filmmaking duo was also curious to explore how life goes on. “When you are part of the village and take part in your daily life, of course, you can be shocked by a suicide or more than one suicide,” Bastin says. “But you have to move forward. As a viewer, you have time to think about the suicides because you are not in your daily life. So that was interesting for us.”

The film is also something of a police procedural in the way it explores is the day-to-day work the police mustd o. “The two policemen are local agents, so they are not investigators,” highlights Bastin. “And they don’t face murders, but suicides. So these are cases that cannot be solved.”

Bogaert and Bastin are already working on a new feature, this time inspired by the Belgian city of Charleroi, where — you guessed it! — Bogaert grew up. The city has an industrial past, along with the challenges this brings today. The duo doesn’t have an official title to unveil yet or full details. But Bogaert has this tease to share: “We follow the characters in their daily lives, but they are confronted by a catastrophe — an explosion of coal waste.”