Special Movie Night : MICHEL GONDRY, DO IT YOURSELF at Alliance Française

MICHEL GONDRY, DO IT YOURSELF
Directed by François Nemeta | 2023 | 80 min

If Georges Méliès had a modern-day heir, it would be Michel Gondry. A visionary and eccentric DIY artist, Gondry reshaped the language of the music video and contemporary cinema with a style that is instantly recognizable—handmade, poetic, playful, and deeply human. From iconic collaborations with Björk, Daft Punk, The White Stripes, Beck, and The Rolling Stones, to his Oscar-winning film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Gondry has consistently followed his imagination rather than industry rules.

Michel Gondry, Do It Yourself offers a rare and intimate journey into his inventive creative process, from his earliest video clips to the making of The Book of Solutions, selected at Cannes in 2023. Directed by François Nemeta—Gondry’s longtime collaborator and former first assistant—the film draws on rich personal archives and testimonies from artists such as Kylie Minogue, Beck, Jack White, Spike Jonze, Charlotte Gainsbourg, and Jack Black.

At its core, Gondry’s DIY practice is both a celebration of wonder and a quiet political act: a belief in imperfection, imagination, and making things by hand. As he prepares a new studio musical starring Pharrell Williams, Janelle Monáe, Missy Elliott, and Da’Vine Joy Randolph, this documentary reminds us why Gondry remains one of the most singular and inspiring artists of our time.

Welcome to the handmade, marginal universe of a true magician of images.