Technical Specifications
Year: 1972
Director: Michel Soutter
Director of Photography: Simon Edelstein
Distribution: Citel Films
Runtime: 84’
Language: French
Production: Groupe 5, Télévision Suisse-Romande (TSR)
Distribution of the Restored Version: Cinémathèque suisse
Restoration Information
Restoration: Cinémathèque suisse
2K Image Digitisation-Colour Grading-Image Restoration: Cinegrell
Sound Digitisation: Cinegrell
Sound Restoration: Tonstudio Z
Synopsis
Lucien (Jacques Denis) is picking fruit and vegetables for Alice (Marie Dubois). Meanwhile, Léon (Jean-Luc Bideau) has an argument with his friend, Max (Michel Cassagne), and bumps into Lucien at a restaurant. Lucien asks him to deliver the basket of vegetables to the fair-haired Alice. Léon accepts but catches sight of a brunette and falls for her charm. At the heart of the Geneva countryside, the characters encounter each other in mischievous and joyful chaos. The plot is not preoccupied with realism, celebrating instead spontaneity and the magic of the moment. “Playing on appearances, Soutter constructs, much like a playwright with the precision of a watchmaker, an entertaining spectacle where the mechanics verge on vaudeville. However, he exploits the meaning that emerges, not the anecdotes that shape it. As is always the case with him, Soutter is barely interested in telling a story. He prefers to combine numerous stories, gleaned from wandering plots that follow a single principle: an encounter.” (Freddy Buache)
Regarding the Film's Restoration
Selected for competition at Cannes Film Festival in 1972, Les Arpenteurs by Michel Soutter is one of the most iconic films of new Swiss cinema. For the restoration, the Cinémathèque suisse based its work on the 35mm negative blow-up and the optical sound negative from the Schwarz collection. A copy from the collection of the Federal Department of Home Affairs was used as a reference for the colour grading. The two versions were compared using ARRI technology with a freeze-frame function. The 2K digitisation improved the clarity of the image in comparison to the 35mm copies, once again revealing the grain of the 16mm film originally used. The “flaws” of the original (inconsistent lighting, continuity errors, etc.) have been preserved.