Gérard Chouchan

Gérard Chouchan (1934-2022) was a French film director. Trained at IDHEC, he worked for television as an assistant starting in 1959, then as a director from 1964 onwards. A committed auteur, he portrayed a wide range of social backgrounds and was interested in people's intimacy. He filmed people who until then had not been represented on the small screen. For example, he gave a voice to women in Éliane Victor's documentary series Les femmes aussi, in which he portrayed a number of unusual women for the time, heralding the advent of May 68. He also diversified the social groups represented, taking an interest in farmers in Livre blanc : Les paysans, for example, but also in workers and shopkeepers. Later, he became interested in the fictionalization of reality, because for him, documentary objectivity primarily involves subjectivity. The end of his career demonstrates the director's attraction to educational films, teaching both the history of science and various forms of knowledge.