Director’s cut for Euro 2008
Euro 2008 is a wrap. So how did it match up in terms of drama against what you would find in the cinema? swissinfo caught up with Swiss expert Frédéric Maire.
Maire, director of the Locarno International Film Festival and a passionate follower of the beautiful game, says there was plenty of good to be found during the tournament, nothing really bad, and nothing really ugly reared its head.
swissinfo: Was a Germany-Spain final a fitting end to Euro 2008?
Frédéric Maire: Yes, even if it lacked a little suspense and there weren’t enough developments to keep the story going at the end. A 2-1 score would have been more enjoyable. But it was a good moment of the tournament.
swissinfo: So was the script any good?
F.M.: For European Championships there is no script. It’s a lot of improvisation when it’s time to shoot. The writing goes into knowing how to start and choosing the cast. Once you’ve brought actors together from different nations, cultures and backgrounds, you don’t know where it will lead you.
That Spain managed to reach the final and win wasn’t expected. But this improvisation you get when shooting a movie is sometimes a guarantee of quality.
swissinfo: Who were the good guys and who were the bad guys?
F.M.: Without a doubt the good guys were the Spanish, because they won but also because their football was brave, aggressive and showed how much they enjoyed playing. A bit like the Dutch and the Portuguese.
There weren’t any real baddies. Let’s say the Swiss were unlucky and perhaps a little lazy.
swissinfo: Did the Swiss star in a bad B-movie?
F.M.: You get the films you deserve. We tried, but we could have done better. Let’s say it was a B-movie – not bad, but still a B-movie.
swissinfo: A film usually has its fill of surprises that help recapture the spectator’s attention. What caught your attention at the Euro?
F.M.: Among the most dramatic moments for us Swiss was Turkey’s second goal. I saw it happen in the most incredible circumstances. I was stuck at Munich airport and I couldn’t see the match. I left the terminal to try to see the game on a giant screen along with thousands of Turks. I was happy to see at least the last two minutes of the match – but those minutes turned out to be fatal for the Swiss [when Turan scored the winner for Turkey]!
The best moments were Dutch games. France-Netherlands for example. And the final. But I have to admit I didn’t see it all as I was on the road a lot lately.
swissinfo: And what the most romantic scene? French coach Raymond Domenech asking his girlfriend to marry him after his team was eliminated?
F.M.: That was an error in communication – there was nothing romantic about it. For me, the most romantic moment was when Spain’s Prince Felipe kissed his wife in front of the cameras. Seeing a young couple that will take over the Spanish throne do that so joyously was something.
swissinfo: One of the tournament’s characteristics was the way the matches were filmed. What do you think of it as a specialist?
F.M.: The specialist is not impressed with the result. There was plenty of technology, with cameras everywhere, flying cameras, lots of lovely slow-motion replays. The problem is that all those pictures were controlled by Uefa, which meant the games all looked the same.
At the World Cup, for example, directors are often given more freedom for their picture choice. You often got to see something unexpected, or even not nice – remember France-Italy in 2006 [when Zidane headbutted Materazzi]. But everything was not formatted like at this Euro: the same shots of the coaches, the same look-down views etc.
It was the same for the sound. I remember the sound being much more present at other championships: the coach screaming, the atmosphere around the ground. I suppose they preferred to avoid problems and potential scandals by toning down and formatting the sound.
It’s the Hollywood effect: formatted films which conform to a preconceived idea – and in so doing lose the personal touch of an author telling a story.
swissinfo-interview: Mathias Froidevaux and Bernard Léchot
Switzerland co-hosted the Euro 2008 football tournament with Austria from June 7-29.
The first round games were played in four cities in Switzerland (Basel, Bern, Geneva and Zurich) and four cities in Austria (Innsbruck, Klagenfurt, Salzburg and Vienna). The semifinals were hosted by Basel and Vienna and the final was held in Vienna on June 29.
The finals were broadcast in 170 countries and were expected to be watched by about eight billion cumulative TV viewers.
Frédéric Maire was born in 1961 in Neuchâtel to a Swiss father and Italian mother.
He has been making films since 1979, with a strong portfolio of fiction features and short films.
From 1988 to 1992, he taught an introductory course on audiovisual production at the DAVI film school in Lausanne.
In 1992, he co-founded the Lanterna Magica, a film club for young people aged six to 11, which he co-directs with Vincent Adatte and Francine Pickel.
From 2000 to 2004, he was a member of the committee of experts of the Montecinemaverità Foundation in Lugano.
He was appointed director of the Locarno International Film Festival in 2006.
In June 2008 Maire announced he would stand down from Locarno in 2009 and succeed Hervé Dumont as head of the Swiss Film Archive.
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