Écrire la vie - Annie Ernaux racontée par des lycéennes et des lycéens

Claire Simon

Claire Simon widely contributed to the recognition and promotion of documentary cinema
in France through the many films that have left their mark on the French cinematographic
landscape. Claire Simon’s films are a reflection of the question she has ceaselessly been
asking herself: What is a story? What is a story nowadays? She makes a hero out of anyone
she’s filming, whether they are children, a young couple, young teenagers, repair shop
technicians, or family planning counselors.

Born in London, Claire Simon grew up in France and began her studies in ethnology. Self-
taught, she learned to edit, then directed her first short films in the 1980s, before joining

the Ateliers Varan, where she became familiar with the realist style of direct cinema,
exploring its range of possibilities. After several short films (The Police, Domestic Disputes)
and documentaries (Recess, At All Costs), she made her first fiction feature film, A Foreign
Body, in 1997. Throughout her career, the filmmaker has enjoyed mixing fiction and reality,
as illustrated by Human Geography (2012, documentary) and Gare du Nord (2013, fiction).
Whether documentary or fiction, all her work boils down to one question: What is a story?
A life?
At the same time, she has taught at the university of Paris 8 and Paris 7 as well as Ateliers
Varan while also being the head of the directing department at La Fémis.