LE CAP FERRET THE NEW ELDORADO OF FRENCH CINEMA

On May 1st,guillaume Canet’s new film Nous finirons ensemble was released in cinemas and is the awaited sequel, after the success of the sleeper hit Les Petits Mouchoirs (Little White Lies), a film that revealed Le Cap Ferret to an incredibly large audience. Since then, stars and ordinary folk alike flock to this peninsula to feel like they’re living on a movie set.

Nine years ago, Les Petits Mouchoirs directed by Guillaume Canet was released on screens. The film was praised by the public (5.2 million viewers), abused by the critics (Liberation spoke about “The Big

Chill combined with the French television soap opera Plus belle la vie“,) and snubbed by the industry (two second-rate nominations at the Césars). Whether to drag him down or to save him, people talked about similariities between movies, Vincent, François, Paul et les autres by Claude Sautet or Mes

Meilleurs Copains by Jean-marie Poiré.

For his film - very much inspired by his own life - Canet indeed brought together his bunch of friends. The small world of cinema called them “la bande du Trésor“, named after the Productions du Trésor managed by Alain Attal, who first produced a short film (Guillaume Canet), a first feature film (Gilles Lellouche), before collecting a statuette at the Oscars (Jean Dujardin) and a compression by César (François Cluzet). All of them form a family that bathes in cinema, loves humor and films from the 70s and doesn’t take themselves too seriously. Accompanied by some external elements, including male and female actors Pascale Arbillot, Laurent Lafitte (known to Gilles Lellouche at the cours Florent), Marion Cotillard or Valerie Bonneton, the “original“gang could only get better. But on this list, Guillaume Canet summoned, for this week of holiday between friends, a character who had an important role to play. For those who did not know yet, in 2010, Le Cap Ferret became the place to come and eat oysters with a nice guy (Jean-louis) interpreted by Joël Dupuch, who has become the most famous oyster farmer in France. Here, the water can be as blue as the Mediterranean and as far as the eye can see, the beaches make you forget about the hassle of understanding the tides. Here, the natural setting of this resort, three quarters of an hour from Bordeaux, was part of the storyline.

Shot in his own wooden house, Guillaume Canet wanted to simply make a film in a place he loved. In May 2009, a few months before the shooting, the small team come to spend a few days, as if to tame the Bay.

Here, they learned the basics about the region: “Arcachon is more popular, le Pyla is more sophisticated and Le Cap Ferret - the Ferret, for the locals - more authentic”, says William Joinau who created hotel La Maison du Bassin in 1997. This wooden hotel, just a minute’s walk from the water seduced Sébastien Bazin, the CEO of

Groupe Accor, to the point of becoming the owner of the premises in 2015.

“In the beginning, La Maison du Bassin is what made foreigners, Germans, Italians and English, discover Cap Ferret”, he explains. More popular than international travel magazines, the film Les Petits Mouchoirs, broadcast on television, has made its effect, attracting a lot of “curious folks”, much to the regret of the people from Bordeaux who wanted to keep their peninsula for themselves, just like those secret and charming villages known to a few insiders, which end up attracting tides of tourists. This fear is similar to what Françoise Sagan wrote in Avec mon meilleur souvenir (With Fondest Regards), in reference to another small, famous port in the South of France: “To my friends and to myself, there was only one year that seemed normal: when Saint-tropez belonged to us

(of course), the one where we were the only ones to use and abuse the sea, its sand, its solitude and its beauty.”

Despite the prophecy, so often mentioned but still quiet, the Tropezian phenomenon makes Cap Ferret tremble. Recently, the owner of the decoration shop opposite the pier almost choked when asked by newly arrived passengers: “So, where can we see the stars?” Of course , last summer the producer Dimitri Rassam (Carole Bouquet and Jean-pierre Rassam’s son) and

Charlotte Casiraghi were waiting for their baby in one of the “44” houses, the 44 hectares located at the tip of the peninsula, where, during Parisian dinners it’s good to mention that you have a house (this is the case for Audrey Tautou). Hugo Sélignac - executive producer of Les Petits

Mouchoirs - also found refuge in summer. “When he was shooting, Guillaume called us to say that he was going surfing between shooting dates, says a producer, so it leaves you dreaming.” But even before Les Petits Mouchoirs, the Cap Ferret had already seen the coming and going of legends from French cinema, Lino Ventura, Roger Vadim or Alain Delon, who spent hours in front of the beach hotel where he lived.

In one of the scenes from Nous finirons ensemble, Canet seems to enjoy the clash of cultures between the “real” Ferretcapiens and their newly inherited “stars”. With his big Audi parked in a supermarket lot, Gilles Lellouche - in the role of the actor who has succeeded - is summoned to bugger off, the fact that he’s “known” doesn’t change anything. “Actually, people come

here to be free”, says one of the real estate dealers who has made several transactions over the past ten years, but then says: “or at least think they are free. The idea here is that you can go barefoot if you want, wear shorts if it makes you happy and be nobody, if you want to be forgotten.” Exactly

like in the films Les Petits Mouchoirs and

Nous finirons ensemble. It’s as if the fiction had finally inspired the reality and when summer comes, everyone integrates the team working on the same film directed by Guillaume Canet. Nous finirons ensemble, by Guillaume Canet, in theaters now. With François Cluzet, Marion Cotillard, Gilles Lellouche, Pascale Arbillot, Laurent Lafitte, Benoit Magimel, Valerie Bonneton, Jose Garcia.

LA MAISON DU BASSIN

I had a friend who would have killed someone if they made off with his

“La Maison du Bassin” lighter (a lighthouse). I had never understood why until I saw this hotel with 11 rooms, all with white wooden slats (Hamptons style) and with furniture gleaned by the former owners, Nicole and William Joinau, located in the heart of the fishing village, one minute from the Arcachon Bay. Today, it is part of Kaa Hotels with Martin Bazin, son the CEO of Accor at the head - a small chain of hotels in Saint-briac (on the Emerald Coast in Brittany), Méribel (in the Alps) and here. LV 5, rue des Pionniers, 33970 Cap Ferret. Tel. 05 56 60 60 63. Lamaisondubassin.com

CHEZ HORTENSE (VU AU CINÉMA!)

In the film Nous finirons ensemble, Bernadette played her own role bringing the bill. In real life, she’s the boss and keeps the place together at Chez Hortense, since the 70s. Guinguette on the beach, plaid place mats, ordinary plates and a breathtaking view of the dune du Pilat. Obviously, like the houses we rent or buy here, the question is never raised: the tables “on the front line” say a little about your rank. LV Avenue du Sémaphore, Cap Ferret.

Tel. 05 56 60 62 56. Open daily during the high season and school holidays. Open weekends in the off season.