When Marseille’s iconic writer-director Marcel Pagnol is asked to pen the story of his life, his younger self incarnate comes to help him remember and make sense of his early days. 

Marcel Pagnol is not only one of 20th century France’s greatest writers and directors for the stage, as well as film, but above all a symbol of his home town: Marseille. So extraordinary is his reputation that to this day people name their kids after characters of his works.

Marcel et Monsieur Pagnol finds the master at age 60, with many successes to his name and life’s dusk clearly in sight. French fashion magazine Elle asked him to write a column about his childhood and youth, but he doesn’t know what to say – until Marcel appears, his younger self, who brings back memories of Pagnol’s hard early days as a writer, when he had to work as a teacher in Paris to make ends meet, till his breakout successes with Marius, 1929 in theatre, then two years later in cinema. With Marcel et Monsieur Pagnol, the audience is invited to discover the early days of sound filmmaking in France as an adventure in local genius and international aspiration – all animated lively and cheerfully!

– Olaf Möller