Private Project

Lila & Valentin

After a serious car accident, Lila is in a coma. To save her, Valentin has only one choice: he has to connect to her mind thanks to a scientific, yet uncertain procedure. He will be assisted by a medical team that will carry out this experience for the first time. The world of thoughts is unstable and unreal. Hidden in Lila's memories, fears and traumas, Valentin has to find her conscience as if he was in a labyrinth.

  • Adrien Lhommedieu
    Director
  • Adrien Lhommedieu
    Writer
  • Pierre-Antoine Carpentier
    Producer
  • Julie Prayez
    Key Cast
  • Simon Dusart
    Key Cast
  • Pascal Lengagne
    Original Score
  • Project Title (Original Language):
    Lila & Valentin
  • Project Type:
    Short
  • Genres:
    Sci-Fi, romance, love story, dreams
  • Runtime:
    18 minutes 30 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    January 1, 2015
  • Country of Origin:
    France
  • Country of Filming:
    France
  • Language:
    French
  • Shooting Format:
    RED
  • Aspect Ratio:
    1:85
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    Yes
  • Student Project:
    No
  • Palm Springs International Short Film Festival
    Palm Springs
    June 26, 2015
    Norts America
  • Aesthetica Short Film Festival
    York
    October 8, 2015
    United Kingdom
  • Court Devant Film Festival (région selection)
    Yvelines
  • Festival International du Court Métrage de Lille (hors compétition)
    Lille
  • Tally Short Film Festival
    Florida
  • Hong Kong Art House Film Festival
  • Hollywood Sky Film Festival
  • Indie Film Festival
    Switzerland
  • Texas Ultimate Short Film Festival
    Texas
  • Cleveland International Film FEst
Director Biography - Adrien Lhommedieu

Adrien directed his first short movie at 22 with L'ESCAUT PRODUCTIONS. The plot was already a challenge: how can someone's life turn upside down in less than five minutes?
The film 5'13" is made up of one long take. It has been co-written with Pierre Courrège, photographed by Baptiste Magnien and supported by major technical providers (Transpalux, Mikros).
After a 9-month stay in LOS ANGELES, he carried out several photographic projects while continuing his cinematographic career. Adrien's directing style is often unconventional, halfway between Jeff Wall and David Lynch.
His meeting with the production company U-MAN FILMS was a turning point in his career. He entered the world of advertising and music videos.
The music video RAISE ME UP, produced by U-MAN FILMS for UNIVERSAL MUSIC has been viewed more than one million times on YouTube.
Adrien grew up by the Channel, where the sky is tortured by powerful winter winds. When he started writing LILA & VALENTIN, a film-poem displaying his main motifs, he found out he had affinities with Terrence Malick's work.
He attended several screenwriting seminars (ROBERT MCKEE, CHRISTOPHER VOGLER et JEAN-MARIE ROTH) and is currently writing his first feature film on the theme of memory.

Add Director Biography
Director Statement

LILA & VALENTIN emerged from a strong, yet unexpected impulse.
I had had in mind to adapt Edgar Allan Poe's poem A DREAM WITHIN A DREAM for several months. At that time, my cinematographic influences were ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND, THE TREE OF LIFE and INCEPTION. I wanted to talk about mind travel via a love story, but I did not manage to build up a story around that theme.
It all clicked into place when I watched two short films: THE GANZFELD PROCEDURE by Keith McCarthy and APRICOT by Ben Briand. Two strong themes made a deep impression on me: memory (the impact of the past on our present life) and scientific experiment as a way to gain access to somebody's soul.
Then, I wrote Lila & Valentin quite rapidly, making the most of Robert McKee's seminar that I had followed a few weeks before to structure – and break down – the story I wanted to tell.
I have always been fascinated by myths. When Orpheus goes down in the Underworld to get his beloved back, he puts his own life at risk. Love transcends the boundaries of time and space. It can be immortal and infinite.
Valentin embodies a tragic hero who has to confront Lila's incoherent and complex inner world. Her own underworld, which could turn into heaven.