Beyond the Screen with Joseph Areddy

How did you meet Fabrice, and how many words did it take to accept the job?

I met Fabrice Aragno more than 25 years ago when I shot his short film DIMANCHE, which is a beautiful piece and exposes Fabrice's sensibilities that remain to this day. The film screened at Cannes and Camerimage and many festivals, but I had moved to Madagascar and missed it all.

Fifteen years later he sent me the script to his first dramatic feature – THE LAKE. The script itself is a piece of art, a poem, a rich tapestry of sensations and emotions that somehow deeply moved me, even though there is no storyline, no dialogue, no linearity. As with DIMANCHE, I immediately wanted to shoot the film.

Ten years later, the film screens in Locarno.

Correct. The project incubated for many years – we discussed so many ideas, we tested things, we had initial proof of concept shoots, we developed – along with Maxime Raymond, my brilliant first assistant – an approach to equipment knowing we would be on a tiny sailboat out in the middle of the lake and hoping for radically different weather and humidity and light and temperature conditions.

What WERE you and Fabrice looking for?

Fabrice had very specific ideas, endless reserves of references, is an incredibly capable cinematographer himself with wide open knowledge of the possibilities of techniques beyond traditional expectations of creating images and we explored and together built a plan.

We tried to shoot the film at several moments over the 10 years. I knew though that we would make it eventually and by the time we actually started shooting, so much information had been exchanged that we somehow knew exactly where we were going, even though every day was an experiment in filmmaking, something we referred to as a workshop of discovery.

It was impossible to plan a day’s shoot. Nothing was locked down, literally. And we knew this was the way it would be, embraced it, even hoped for it…those miracles of light and confluences of circumstances.

What role did the actors have?

Clothilde Courau and Bernard Stamm were involved from the very beginning and in fact Fabrice wrote the project with Clothilde in mind.
It was extraordinary having a very experienced actress out on a sailboat skippered by her co-actor who is at the same time a world-renowned sailor.

We were only able to manage the risks and unpredictability of Lake of Geneva because Bernard was the captain and made the tactical decisions… and therefore we could concentrate on filming, knowing we were safe when otherwise we truly were perhaps not.

What was the main challenge in shooting the film?

I often attached myself to the boat at different support points for stability – and safety. It was extremely physical work, but this allowed us to put the camera in places on the vessel under any conditions. We used no artificial lights. We controlled light with negative fill inside the cabin and sometimes shot in “studio” environments, where we anchored or tied up at the dock and recreated movement of the waves and light.

Sometime Rob-Jan Lacombe, our wonderful AD/set manager/line producer/etc., would swing and bounce on a rope attached to the mast and dock to recreate movement. So much fun to watch.

We shot with Fabrice’s gorgeous Leica R lenses and my Lomo High Speeds and several specialty lenses in several formats, including 35mm.

Maxime Raymond and his second, Solane Mercier, managed this equipment in extremely difficult situations absolutely brilliantly from inside the cabin often bouncing off the walls and not knowing which way the boat was going, when it would turn or come about.
Maxime was pulling focus and handing up gear, and they were offloading data, and everything worked all the time. And we’d call "cut", and would look down in on them, and they were both always smiling and laughing.

They both loved the experience. Maxime would say he wished we could just keep shooting THE LAKE forever. Chapeau to you both!

In 2024, you won the Swiss Film Award for Best DOP. How has the award affected you?

I am truly honored by the award.
In fact, I need to send it to Peter Demmer, my gaffer on BISONS… the award needs to live at his house for a while.

And then it should be sent to Marion Schramm, the production designer. And Aurel Ganz and Reto Gelshorn from my camera team and to Serge Musy the first AD, and to Elisabeth Mehu and Martine Felber costumes and makeup and to Nicolas Zen-Ruffinen, our brilliant production manager, and of course spend some time at Pierre Monnard’s if he still has room on his mantel for another award and at the places of Xavier Grin, Maxime Valvini, Karim Barras and India Hair… and there are so many more places it belongs.

The award affected me and I wanted to say it at the acceptance speech: I didn’t win, we did, all of us. I am nothing on my own.

How DO you make the decision to join a project?

It is essential for me to surround myself with collaborators who share my sensibilities of how vastly privileged we are to be working in this industry and how nothing is precious nor unattainable and to bring this understanding to the set everyday which leads to an environment of focus and respect and love.

I count on the people I work with and am absolutely blessed to have found a group of talented, intelligent, funny and devoted people.

Were you already interested in cameras as a child?

I have been shooting films since the age of nine, where I started with my grandfather making regular 8mm movies. He taught me how to read a light meter and so many other things. His movies were hilarious, and he drove his family crazy because he always wanted them to be his actors and he was very tedious and demanding. Well done, Grandpa!

At film school I just wanted to shoot other people's films and became infatuated with the work of Sven Nykvist with whom I had the privilege of meeting and interning with during his NYC period. He once said to me how important it is to choose well the projects you decide to shoot, they will shape your work. He was absolutely right, but he was, is, in another league and had the luxury of this choice.

I have been fortunate to develop the confidence and visual language with strong directors like Fabrice Aragno and Fred Baillif, Pierre Monnard, Hugues Hariche, Pablo Martin Torrado, Bruno Deville and at the moment Léa Fazer to name a few - all of whom have individual voices but the common characteristic of a desire to create films through sincere collaboration.