Avoir 20 ans 

by the scholars
of Lumiere High School
in Luxeuil-les-Bains

France

Director:
Clémentine Falvisaner,
Marie-Amélie Simard,
Apolline Oudot,
Candy Urmes

Year: 2014

DCP, Color, 20 min, French

It took them 20 years to meet, at last. Two big children of same age, two neighbours who wanted so much to know each other that they finally merged. FICA (Vesoul international film festival of Asian cinema) and the Lumière festival (festival of the Lumière high school in Luxeuil-les Bains) were born in the same year to make people share their common passion for cinema.

The Lumière festival has a competition for school videos and allows students (from high school, college and higher education institutions) with a passion from cinema to have their short films shown to an audience for a whole week-end in May. The event is organized by students attending the cinema-audiovisual optional section at Lumière high school.To celebrate this dual anniversary a partnership was tied between the two cultural events. Students from the cinemaaudiovisual optional section at Lumière high school could access the backstage of the international film festival, its organization and numerous other friendly and festive aspects characterizing it. Because one is a bit mad at the age of twenty; this is precisely the theme filmed by these high school students for their 26 minutes documentary.

Clémentine Falvisaner and Marie-Amélie Simard (high school tenth grade cinema-audiovisual section) along with Apolline Oudot and Candy Urmes (high school eleventh grade- Terminale L- cinema-audiovisual section) came to FICA with their video cameras and microphones to record the backstage work and interview volunteers, the audience and directors throughout the event. They could discover cinemas from all over Asia and appreciate the cordial and festive atmosphere of the event, during which they were given a warm welcome from all participants. The fruit of a collective work, “To Be Twenty” is the title of the documentary they wrote, shot and edited with help from their cinemaaudiovisual teacher Cécile Marchocki, as well as from Guillaume Labrude and Lise Atamaniuk, two students from the European Institute of Cinema and Audiovisual in Nancy. To be twenty is a terrible and thrilling matter. It is the age of every certitude and doubt, of every opportunity, choice and happiness. It is a fleeting age only lasting enough for a few laughers and already far-off memories. This is what these students wanted to capture through their film, to set in a few minutes what it means to be twenty.