Cannes, France (AP) — Kristen Stewart has been talking about the director as long as she is acting. Many people didn't encourage it.
“I always talked to other actors when I was little: because it was like, 'I want to direct a film!” “I have to have an incredible toolkit or some kind of qualification, which can be very elegantly dropped out. ”
Stewart's feature debut, The Chronology of Water, is not necessarily an elegant fall at the Cannes Film Festival. She arrives at Cannes after a desperate rush to complete the film. This is an adaptation of Lydia Yunavich's 2011 memoir starring Imogen's poo. Sitting on the balcony overlooking Croisette, Stewart says he finished the film “30 seconds ago before boarding the plane.”
“It was eight years and then it was a really accelerated push. It was a clear comparison, but birth,” Stewart says. “I was really pregnant and I was screaming for a bloody murder.”
However, the arrival of the “Water Chronology” was dramatic, but it was emphasized. The film is a sharp and impressive portrait of the arrival of a brutal era, and is the obvious work of a passionate filmmaker. Director Stewart turns out to be very similar to actor Stewart.
For Stewart, the achievement of the “Water Chronology,” which is played with a certain respect and sold at Cannes, was also a revelation of the director's mythology.
“It's that kind of a man's f —–,” she says. “It's really not fair to think it's difficult to make a film as long as you need to know things. We have technical directors, but Jesus Christ, you hire a crew.
“My lack of experience made this film.”
Stewart's first step as director came eight years ago with the short “Come Swim.” She premiered in Cannes in 2017. This festival generates questions you like in the film. It was then that Stewart began to adapt his memoirs of Yuknavitch.
In it, Yunavich tells her life, starting with sexual abuse from her father (the architect played by Michael Epp in the film). Competitive swimming is one of her only escapes, which helps her take her from home to college. Blissful freedom, self-scientific addiction and trauma come to color for years from there, as well as his inspirational writing experience with Ken Kessy (Jim Belushi from the film). Stewart calls the book “Lifesaver – like a flotation device, actually.”
“This book was an invitation to this weapon to listen to your own voice. It's really difficult if you're walking around a girl's body,” Stewart says. “It fragments in a way that feels true to my internal experiences than I've ever read.”
“I really wanted to make something about not what happened to this person, but about what happened to her and what could be done for you,” Stewart adds. “It's kind of the most meta, crazy experience to crack open up yourself at the same time.”
That applies to the 35-year-old British actor who offers one of her best, most extensive performances in “Water Chronology.”
“It's Lydia's life story, the cards she's dealt with, but in terms of her reactive nature, that's the experience of women,” says Poots. “How you are being monitored, how you respond, how you fit, how it repels, and how you interfere with something good. All of this is very, very, very female.”
Together, Stewart and Poots are clearly tied together by experience. Stewart calls Poots “brothers now.” In her best experience with Stewart's director, she says, it's a swap of interactions that would break down separate jobs.
“But I told her there was nothing to help her and talked too much,” Stewart says. Poots immediately disagree: “That's not true, Kristen!”
“Kristen is incredibly present, but he has this ability like a plant or something, and he has the ability to pick up a small shift in the atmosphere like 'Wait a minute',” Puets made Stewart laugh. “This insane brain is playing with it, and it's a skill set that comes in the form of intense curiosity.”
That curiosity now involves directing more films. “Water Chronology” may show not only a new chapter of one of the bravest actors in American cinema, but also an ongoing artistic evolution.
“We created it was a wreck so we basically had to put the boat back together,” Stewart said of the editing process. Its reassembly, Stewart believes it helped to make “water chronology” too pre-determined.
“There was no way to make this film under more normal circumstances,” Stewart says.
Jake Coyle has been covering the Cannes Film Festival since 2012. He has seen around 40 films at this year's festival and reports that he stands out.
For more information about the 2025 Cannes Film Festival, please visit https://apnews.com/hub/cannes-film-festival.
