“Polar Park”, an art detective series that combines cold murders and humor

As if it wasn’t already difficult enough to have multiple agendas coincide, it’s the day of the national strike. Therefore, the conversation between the two actors will take place in a virtual bistro room, as in a prison. No big deal, because behind their screens it seems like yesterday that Jean-Paul Rouve, 56, and Guillaume Gouy, 39, broke up. And since only the former will be in Lille at the Series Mania festival – the latter selected to shoot Christopher Thompson’s next series – this is an opportunity to receive news. Between two jokes about the younger’s beard, which is left for the needs of his next project, Jean-Paul Rouve says he is happy to visit his native region. Polar ParkOne who hasn’t starred in the series since appearing a few times as a young lad Julie Lesko.

Designed and produced for Arte by Gérald Hustasch-Mathieu, Polar Park presents itself as a movie version of itself Pupupidoo, released in 2011. The same setting – the Jurassic massif and the coldest town of Mouthe (Doubs) in France – the same duo of detectives – the author of inspired thrillers and the police with a chilling repartee – carried by the same duo of actors. , the same balance between comedy and drama. But not the same story: this time it’s not about solving a murder, but about several that have in common an aesthetic staging inspired by works of art.

If the series, to some extent, reflects on the developed celebrity Pupupidoo Starting with the figure of Marilyn Monroe, it is conceived less as a remake than as a parallel version. As Gérald Hustach-Mathieu says, Pupupidoo May be the film directed by the main characters Polar Park »Guillaume Gouy, who portrays Officer Luveto, a tough gendarme who sets out on the trail of a killer, explains with malice. On paper, it looks complicated; However, everything is very fluid in these six episodes, which are at once tense and funny, playing with the codes of thriller and burlesque.

“I get the impression that many filmmakers are having fun [dans le monde des séries] Like on the playground. » Guillaume Guy

between the film and Polar Park, a little more than ten years have passed. We are still far from the twenty-six years that separate us Fire walk with me of the third season Twin Peaks (Two works by Gérald Hustach-Mathieu are also embellished with Link references), but the file has passed through several hands. The adaptation is being helmed by Céline Camina, who is the director and Jean-Paul Rouve’s agent. Pupupidoo It eventually landed on Arte, who will hand it over to him a little later in the year. “Gerald’s world is very distinctive and quite atypical, it is difficult to impose it in the cinema. Guillaume Gouy notes. He was able to take advantage of the streak. It’s a freer world. I get the impression that many filmmakers have fun there as a playground. Gerald knew how to conquer this space. » Jean-Paul Rouve confirms: “If you don’t know Gerald, his scripts must be quite difficult to read. It’s good that its producers and Arte trusted their people. »