The 52-year, 35-picture collaboration between Lelouch and Lai was at the heart of a masterclass by the director at the Venice Film Festival

By Melenie Goodfellow | Aug 2024

French director Claude Lelouch first broke out internationally with 1966 romance A Man and a Woman, starring Anouk Aimee and Jean-Louis Trintignant as a widow and widower whose fledgling love story is held back by past personal tragedies.

Nearly 60 years later, the soundtrack by late composer Francis Lai – and in particular its title track, which is often referred to as ‘Chabadabada’ for its catchy refrain – remains as famous, if not more famous, than the Oscar and Cannes Palme d’Or-winning feature

That movie would mark the start of a 52-year, 35-picture collaboration between Lelouch and Lai, which was at the heart of a music-themed masterclass by Lelouch at the Venice Film Festival on Saturday.

The director is at the festival to receive the Cartier Glory To The Filmmaker Award as well as for the premiere of new work Finalement, starring an ensemble cast led by Kad Merad and also featuring Elsa Zylberstain, Michel Boujenah, Sandrine Bonnaire, Barbara Pravi and Françoise Gillard.

Lelouch first met Lai in 1965 having forged strong connections with the music world through his music videos for the likes of Sylvie Vartan, Françoise Hardy and Dionne Warwick, directing her singing ‘Walk On By’ against the Paris skyline in 1964.

“He spent two hours two hours playing me melodies on his accordion and these melodies spoke to me, to my heart, to the essential,” recounted Lelouch. “He was completely self-taught and there was great freedom in his way of playing, in his harmonies and tonalities.”

Lai’s compositions became part of Lelouch’s creative process as a director and he would get the musician-composer to write soundtracks for his films on the basis of his ideas as part of development.

“I recorded the music for all my films before shooting the films, because I really wanted the actors to listen to the soundtrack and I myself needed to listen to it,” he explained.

This even resulted in two separate films coming to fruition on the basis of Lai’s two musical interpretations of the same idea: Love Is A Funny Thing (1969) and One Plus One (2015).

Lelouch explained how he used the score on set of a Love Is A Funny Thing – starring Jean-Paul Belmondo and Annie Girardot as a French composer and actress who meet while working in L.A.

“In the final scene Annie Girardot’s character is waiting for Belmondo’s character at the airport. She (Girardot) didn’t know whether he was going to descend from the plane or not… the camera is on Girardot, and in Girardot’s ear is the music of the film,” he explained.

“What is interesting is that she really didn’t know whether he was going to come down the steps or not. She wasn’t acting. If she had known, she would have still played the scene well… but in real-life we don’t act.”

Lelouch did not make all his films with Lai, collaborating with other composers such as Michel Legrand, and even bringing their talents together on Bolero, the 1981 saga tracking three generations of musicians and dancers from Russia, Germany, France and the U.S.

The director said this had kept their creative relationship fresh.

“It’s true I did cheat on him from time to time,” he joked. “Francis Lee was always delighted when I came home, like a wife who is happy to see her husband come back home.

“That allowed us not to get too used to one another and this liberty also allowed him to work with other directors too… then, when we re-found one another, we wanted to seduce each other once again.”

Source: Claude Lelouch Recalls ‘Chabadabada’ Composer Francis Lai