A face seen through a round lens held up close to the camera — ▶ Excerpt · 3′55″

200253 minDocumentary

Les Passagers de l'Alsace

Name: Les Passagers de l'Alsace
Genre: Documentary
Released: 2002
Duration: 53 min
Cast: Christine Collin, Henri Dreyfus, Jean-Richard Freymann, Aurore Humbert, Sylvie Levy

The Passengers of Alsace

Rob Rombout crosses Alsace by train, a stranger passing through, and talks with the people he meets, among them Sylvie Levy, Philippe Poirier, Ibtissam Mellouki and Daniel Ziegler, about things that seem to have nothing to do with regional identity. In a compartment nobody knows anyone; all they share is the same train at the same time. Listening, looking out of the window, moving on: from their stories the film draws a portrait of a region, shared for a moment with strangers.

Press

2022A manifestoMarc-Emmanuel Mélon, The Mise en Scène of the Real, Yellow Now, provisional translation · PDF ↗

Photographs

Two crew members with a camera in the basket of a truck-mounted lift in front of a sandstone station building, four people standing below — 2002Strasbourg station

A man in sunglasses beside a large station clock set in carved stone — 2002Strasbourg station

A young woman in a dark jacket beside three crew members leaning in at the door of a helicopter — 2002Alsace, Ibtissam Mellouki and Samuel Dravet

Three men in a small open helicopter on an airfield, one sitting at the door — 2002Alsace, by helicopter

A dark green Mercedes with a film camera mounted on its bonnet, a man in a cap standing at the open door — 2002Alsace

From inside a car: the driver’s glasses in the foreground, a camera and crew on the bonnet seen through the windscreen — 2002Alsace

An older woman with round glasses and a grey scarf in a train seat, looking out of the window — 2002Alsace, Sylvie Levy

A woman with a backpack on a platform as a train passes, a cameraman and a sound recordist with a boom beside her — 2002Alsace, Sylvie Levy

A young woman with headphones round her neck looking in through the window of a van — 2002Alsace, Aurore Humbert

A man with grey curly hair and glasses walking along a yard with containers, a young woman with headphones beside him — 2002Alsace, Philippe Poirier

Three faces close to the camera: a man in a fur hat, a woman with dark hair and a man with glasses — 2002Alsace, Christine Collin and Samuel Dravet

A man with curly grey hair and a moustache in a blue jacket, bare trees and a small chapel behind — 2002Alsace, Daniel Ziegler

Technical sheet

Title: Les Passagers de l'Alsace
Year: 2002
Runtime: 53 min
Countries: France, Belgium
Languages: French
Production: Good & Bad News and Le Meilleur des Mondes, with CBA and RTBF, for France 3 Alsace
Availability: CBA, Brussels · Heure Exquise! (non-commercial)
Versions: 53′ in the credits published in Mélon 2022. An Alsatian-language version exists (p. 158).

Direction: Rob Rombout
Image: Samuel Dravet
Editing: Adriana Moreira de Oliveira
Music: Philippe Poirier
With: Christine Collin, Henri Dreyfus, Jean-Richard Freymann, Aurore Humbert, Sylvie Levy, Ibtissam Mellouki, André Ohrel, André Osterdag, Philippe Poirier, Daniel Ziegler