Claire Simon widely contributed to documentary cinema’s acknowledgment and spreading in France through many films that left a trail in the French cinematographic landscape. Claire Simon’s films reflect the question she never stops asking: what is a story ? What is a story nowadays ?
She makes a hero out of anyone she’s filming, whether they are children, a young couple, young teenagers, fifty yeard old lesbian or family planning’s counselors. Born in London, Claire Simon grew up in France and began her studies in ethnology while also learning in Arabic. Self-taught, she learned to edit and directed her first short films in the 1970s, before joining the Ateliers Varan, where she became familiar with the realist style of direct cinema.
A film by Claire Simon
2024 - France - Documentary
In the Makarenko public elementary school in the Paris outskirts, children want to learn and to be cheered while teachers know they do not only teach, they also educate. With care, tenacity and efforts, children are trained to become not only responsible citizens but also human beings.
A film by Claire Simon
2023 - France - Documentary
In a Parisian public hospital, Claire Simon questions what it means to live in women’s bodies, filming their diversity, singularity and their beauty in all stages throughout life. Unique stories of desires, fears and struggles unfold, including the one of the filmmaker herself.
A film by Claire Simon
2008 - France/Belgium - Comedy/Drama
Djamila would like to be on the pill because her relationship with her boyfriend has become serious stuff now; Zoé’s mother gives her condoms but calls her a whore; Nejma hides her pills outside because her mother searches her bag; Hélène finds herself too fertile; Clémence is scared; Adeline wishes she could have kept it, and so does Margot. Maria Angela would like to know who she’s pregnant by, while Ana Maria has opted for love and freedom. Anne, Denise, Marta, Yasmine, and Milena are the advisers receiving and listening to each of these women as they wonder how sexual freedom can be enjoyed. In God’s offices, you laugh and cry and feel swamped. You dance there, you have a cigarette on the veranda, and you come anonymously to tell the commonplace or unbelievable story of your life.
