Trois-Fois-Rien

(This story is based on interviews of real people, their voices are used directly in the film and helped me shape this fiction!) In the tiny village of "Trois-Fois-Rien," a TV crew films locals gathered around a communal fridge that everyone uses daily. Mid-interview, the fridge suddenly falls into a mysterious hole that appears in the ground. The hole is pitch black and keeps growing with ominous rumbles. Villagers step back each time it expands, then eventually return to their routines. Soon, everyone misses the fridge. Children complain of hunger; adults blame the government. An expedition is organized to retrieve it : two volunteers descend with ropes… and don’t come back. Panic spreads as the hole starts to swallow everything: trees, houses, people…One by one, everyone disappears. Finally, the camera itself tips into the void. After a long silence in darkness, the end credits roll.

Director’s statement
Freshly born in 1999, I grew up with the prospect of the end of humanity. And though it's quite stressful, it has become so commonplace that it's almost turned into a detail, something that bothers us a bit when we think about it, but slips away as soon as we focus on making dinner. This film talks about disconnection, political paralysis, denial, and panic all mixed together.
It is built from real interviews of people who I met in the villages and cities where I lived, people who don't know each other and whom I bring together in a beautiful stop-motion apocalypse. Through editing, these strangers gradually become the villagers of Trois-Fois-Rien, facing the hole together.
I already explored this mockumentary approach in my previous stop-motion film, Human Resources, and I'm currently working again with Trinidad, my graphic co-author. Together we are developing a handheld camera technique to shoot the film as closely as possible to the characters.