Pierre Léon's Book and Film Illuminate Jean-Claude Biette's Obscure Cinema

In 2013, three events celebrated Jean-Claude Biette, the French critic, filmmaker, and music lover who died in 2003: a special issue of Trafic (no. 85, spring 2013), a retrospective of his films at the Cinémathèque française in June, and a book by Pierre Léon covering Biette's seven feature films made between 1977 and 2003. Léon also made a film, Biette (2011), featuring friends and actors. Léon's book and film aim to do justice to Biette's overlooked oeuvre, which remains unavailable on DVD and rarely screened. Léon's approach avoids proof or value systems, instead trusting the films and following the intellectual path of friendship. He describes Biette's camera in Le Théâtre des matières (1977) as "as placid and necessary as a vacuum cleaner in a house." The book is structured as chapters on each film, not in chronological order, creating a charade of images and inspirations. Léon emphasizes both evidence and secrecy, a theme also in Trafic no. 85. He discusses Biette's films as reflections on image and word, labyrinthine narration, and compossible intrigues. The book serves as a "prière d'insérer" and a parabolic disputation, a wandering and lively critical writing.