VINCENT CASSEL: “KEEP THE MYSTERY ALIVE”

Mr. Cassel, how come you always play such raw characters?

I guess because that’s what attracts me, really. Even when I watch people in real life. In French we call it à plusieurs couches.

Are you talking about multi-layered personalities?

Yes. The way people behave, the paradoxes, the contradictions. All these things we have to live with and still pretend that everything is only black or white. That, I think, is the most interesting thing in human nature. The fact that we have to do one thing and pretend something else. That’s when it becomes very interesting. If you can literally speak the way you feel, then it’s not interesting anymore. It’s when you have to lie that it becomes interesting.

Where do you think your interest in this comes from?

I don’t know, I started this career dreaming about Jean Gian Maria Volontè and Robert De Niro and they never really played nice, clean cut, crispy-clean kind of guys. They always played characters that were spiteful but at the same time fascinating. By the time I started to make movies that is the kind of thing that I chose. I think they’re just more interesting. And in a way I think they represent life better than heroes and the so-called good guys, really.

Do you feel that people also show off too much of themselves for the media, that the star is more important than the actor and they can’t disappear behind a role anymore?

It depends on who you are. Some people still manage to disappear. The problem is that the system is made in a way where it’s very hard to escape, you get trapped very easily. I used to be a little more rude. Every time somebody would talk to me about my wife or my kids I would just cut off. But then again, I’d rather be polite because you don’t have to be rude to people.

With that attitude you’ve managed to be referred to as a big star of European cinema. Do you like that description?

I don’t mind it, you know. It’s not totally true, by the way. Maybe from an American point of view Europe is one big thing, but – as you know – Germany is very different from France, is very different from Italy. It’s not like that really. But I guess from that side of the Atlantic, it’s a vision. It’s a possible vision of what we do.

sourse: The Talks