Mélanie Laurent

The claustrophobic film finds Laurent onscreen at all times. She seems to disappear into the part of this desperate and enraged young woman. Liz awakens to find herself locked in a cryogenic chamber with no idea how she got there. Her time for escape is running out fast as the oxygen in the chamber dwindles. Laurent is unquestionably exposed, watched by an omnipresent camera that, nonetheless, never lapses into voyeurism. She was confined to a tiny box nine hours a day during filming, and found herself tangled up with her character’s plight, struggling against onslaughts from a serpent-like syringe and enduring (real!) electric shocks.

Although the actor-filmmaker has always refused to behave like a star, she has, over a career spanning more than 20 years, gone quietly from critically acclaimed French arthouse films, including Philippe Lioret’s Don’t Worry, I’m Fine (which earned her the César Award for Most Promising Actress), to ambitious American productions like Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds and Louis Leterrier’s Now You See Me. With her sleek, blonde elegance and her soft gaze, she usually portrays seemingly well-mannered girls that turn out to be fiercely determined (Beginners), naturally gifted in deception (Return of the Hero), and unexpectedly brave (The Roundup). “I’d never taken so many chances as an actor,” Laurent shares about playing Liz. “What Alex and I liked about her was her vulnerability, her naiveté, and the fact that she could cry and be at the end of her tether in grueling moments.”

A multi-hyphenate artist, Laurent found time to sit down with us in the midst of completing her own film, Le bal des folles (The Mad Woman’s Ball), and on the cusp of directing her first series, With Bare Hands. Simply put, she’s unstoppable!

Franck Garbarz: What drew you to this quite unusual project?
Mélanie Laurent: You’re not offered such an incredible, moving role every day. It was challenging, but I knew it was in Alexandre Aja’s hands, which was exciting. And the idea of surpassing yourself, of going for an unprecedented experience, was a real gift. I read the script in two hours’ time and immediately said yes to Alex and told him I was grateful he’d thought of me.

What struck you about the script?
ML: It was brilliantly written and featured a wide range of emotions. Not only was I fooled the first time I read it, but what really freaked me out was that when I watched the film nine months later, I’d forgotten some of the plot developments. I wondered, How does she pull through?— even though I knew the plot!

You’d never played a character in a sci-fi film or in a scary movie...
ML: I love science fiction. But I still feel like the film is a deeply moving, suffocating, even metaphysical thriller. When I read the script, I didn’t think to myself, What an amazing sci-fi movie. I had no idea where I was, just like the main character. Science fiction most often comes with wide sets, big ideas, new populations, unusual props. In this film, it takes a really long time to find your bearings.

You’re known to be highly aware of environmental issues — and Oxygen’s premise has something to do with those concerns.
ML: If you’re told that in 300 years’ time the earth will be barren, it’s too far away to feel concerned and take a good look at yourself. However, in Oxygen, the premise is the near future, a time when there are even talks about a virus, a major pandemic, the destruction of the planet. When, on top of that, the characters are hardly superheroes, you can feel for them. If you want people to change, and to scare them without discouraging them, it’s all about emotion. That’s what I like about militant, activist cinema, which goes hand in hand with what I did in the past — moving people by letting them know it’s not too late.

How did you approach the character?
ML: What Alex and I were aiming for was that she remain very human, very relatable. And we certainly didn’t want her to be a superheroine, the kind of character who finds answers when everything seems lost and who scoffs at death. You fully empathize with and relate to her. Incidentally, the only changes we brought to the original script were toning down the character’s anger and including some silences. We had to play with those emotions as you wonder what she feels at any given moment.

Liz, your character, experiences a whole range of emotions, from terror to anger to dejection to the sudden joy triggered by a flash of memory.
ML: This was the most challenging thing for me. Rage and anger are feelings that I’m not familiar with and that make me uncomfortable. I never was able to portray them, and I never felt like playing a role using those emotions. When I found out she banged the walls of the unit and yelled insults, I called Alex and told him I was nervous about those scenes. But the upside was that we sometimes shot 30-minute takes, a bit like on the stage, and that I had time to get into the character’s mindset. Besides, we shot in continuity, which is invaluable. I was able to portray the character’s evolution, and when I was back on set the following morning, I’d be “reconnected” with Liz just where I’d left her the night before.

It was all the more challenging as you had no co-star.
ML: Not quite. Alex had offered that I pick who I wanted as a “virtual” co-star in my earpiece, because we needed actual acting beats. I chose my best friend Morgan Perez, who directs me in the films I direct. I’ve known him for 20 years. He’d sort of give me my cues. With Morgan, it didn’t feel like I was playing, but instead like I was experiencing the situations.

The feeling of claustrophobia is so tangible. What was it like being locked up in the unit?
ML: It was easier than playing opposite actual people, and I had a hard time leaving the unit behind! I kind of created a bubble for myself as we were moving out of lockdown, and I went from one bubble to the next, so to speak. The thing is, I’m not claustrophobic at all. However, if Alex had asked me to act in an underwater movie, I’d have turned it down!

Did you have any specific training?
ML: With the physical training came the mental training. I was on an island in Brittany when Alex called me up. I stayed there for another month. I did a lot of running — like I’d never done before. The place is wild, and I captured as many wide spaces as I could in my head, as if I was taking pictures of clouds, of gusts of wind, of the sky. I definitely focused on the elements. It was as though I was to bring that mental photo album along into the unit.

Besides running, how did you train physically?
ML: I worked out and mostly did a lot of ab exercises. All Liz has to move about in is one square foot. I was lying down all day, I had to swing when I got an electric shock or when I pulled out the drips, and so it was the strength-building routine that was helpful because it all comes from your stomach. By the way, I never got hurt. I’d spend eight to nine hours a day inside the unit, but I was fine!

The first sequence reminds you of an animal’s birth, with the newborn fighting for its life...
ML: It wasn’t fun — especially as it was my first day on set. There was a technical issue and instead of shooting it in one day, it took us all of five days. A shroud was pressed against my face, and because it was wet, I couldn’t breathe. I’d squeeze the prop man’s hand when it got insufferable. It’s actually a genuine torture technique. And as if this was not bad enough, I got electric shocks with the wires!

Knowing how unusual this shoot was, did you feel like you engaged in a particularly close relationship with the director?
ML: I did. It was just the two of us. The film could happen together or not happen at all. We couldn’t afford not to go in the same direction. Alex totally adjusted to whatever I was doing, and I let his filmmaking approach guide me. We had to be in perfect sync. Alex is very gentle. He’s not necessarily naturally cheerful — which I relate to a lot. He’s very accurate, and he knows just how to articulate what he wants. It makes for a very enjoyable working environment. I was totally trusting.

On a project like this, one might assume you did quite a lot of rehearsing.
ML: Not at all! We thought we’d lose much of the acting instinct if we did that. I did a costume fitting, I lay down on a bedsheet with the outline of the unit printed on it, and I discovered everything on my first day on set. It was amazing, because if I’d had to rehearse and find out about the unit, I’d have lost my spontaneity. My pal would give me my cue, and Alex would talk to me in my earpiece, adding technical instructions halfway through the scene, which I didn’t mind at all. We saved a lot of time this way. You need to be trusting and extremely flexible. Otherwise it can turn into a nightmare. The same experience with a more unyielding director would have been a hassle. I loved how receptive Alex was. Once again, I was totally focused on my job, and he on his, and both our universes merged into one.