Errol Morris: “I was struck by the honesty, loyalty and humor of John Le Carré”

In the Pigeon Tunnel, documentary filmmaker Errol Morris films the last interview with star writer John Le Carré. A fascinating encounter that he deciphers for us.

The mole, The spy who came in from the cold, The little girl with the drums. We think we know John Le Carre, the greatest spy author of the 20th century. But who was David Cornwell, the man hidden behind this pseudonym? THE greatest merit of Pigeon tunnelsumptuous biographical doc signed Errol Morris to see on Apple TV+it is above all not to try to make him confess anything: “We started our interview by talking about interrogations and interviews,” Morris told us. Wondering if it was the same thing. No doubt a way for him to cover his tracks…”.

Facing the camera, in what remains his last filmed interview, we immediately see the crazy elegance, the laser gaze and the ironic intelligence of the supreme writer. This guy is a sphinx and chose to stay that way. The loneliness, pessimism and masks seem profound, at least as much as his manipulative power. So Morris listens to him. Talking about the somewhat rogue father, his absent mother, the chaos of history that he tried to order in his fictions, women, power… But what we also hear is his melancholy, his regrets and mistakes. His humor too.

During the film, the man reveals little of himself. But we literally understand physically why this writer was able to dominate and still dominates the spy thriller. He gave the world on the verge of explosion a very British form (humor, distance, humanism, cruelty) and above all a depth, an existential perspective which remains unsurpassed. The documentary filmmaker looks back on this extraordinary encounter.

When and how did you come to do this interview with David Cornwell, aka John Le Carré?

This goes back years. I had a producer friend, PJ Van Sandwijk, who was going to do a remake of The Little Girl with the Drum. David was involved and I was asked to do an interview with him. A meeting was quickly arranged but personally, I didn’t know at all what I was going to do… So we talked. What I didn’t know was that he came very prepared. He really wanted to do this interview; he had done all the necessary research. David was someone who worked extremely hard.

Why do you want to do this interview when he himself had written his autobiography and had been the subject of a full biography?

I love this story which is a bit perverse. I think he didn’t like the bio that was dedicated to him. This is why he wanted to write his own memories, in a picaresque, episodic way, almost in the form of a puzzle. I think this last interview was a way for him to dot the i’s. He was a meticulous man. He had even rewatched my films, read my books and armed himself. To this day, I don’t really know what he expected.

And you ? What did you expect? Or rather what were you hoping for?

I never considered that an interview had to be a confrontation… Well, I’m exaggerating a little (laughs). But honestly, everything best or most interesting that has happened to me in this context has always happened a little by chance. It’s not like I’m setting up traps when I interview someone. Regardless, I will always remember the beginning of our meeting.

For what ?

David asked me point blank: “Who are you?” “. We never ask this kind of question. Because I don’t know who I am… Tell me who I am instead! It’s complicated to answer a question like that. At the beginning of the film, we talk about the difference between an interrogation and an interview. Is there a difference? And what does that say about our profession as journalists compared to cops or spies? I like to think that an interview is first and foremost a philosophical exchange. At least that was the case with David.

The difference is also that an interrogation must provide a predetermined answer. Not the interview.

Exactly. When I start an interview, I never know where I’m going to go.

The other difference is that an interrogation is also frozen by fear. While the interview…

Ah, but I’m still afraid.

What ?

Am I going to do a good job? Will I manage not to say stupid things? Am I well prepared? Well… there, I had reread his books. Not all, but many.

Did you have an approach strategy?

A strategy ? As you said: it was not an interrogation. If I come to an interview knowing in advance what the other person is going to say and the questions I am going to ask, what is the point? I know very often that this is how it happens: everything is decided in advance. And it’s hard not to do it like that. But I didn’t have an agenda on this one. I had no list of questions. I just had to be present. Receptive to what was happening. And be engaged in that conversation.

Did you meet with other people to prepare?

No. Because years ago I took a very clear position. I’ve seen films where we interviewed the main character and then his wife, his son, his employees… and so on. But I don’t want to do that: I don’t want to know what people think of them, but what my subject thinks of himself. Besides, this is the question that David asks from the start. His “Who are you?” » means that. How do you see the world? What occupies your thoughts? What interests me in others?

And what interests you about him?

So many things. I would like to tell you honestly that I was able to penetrate this man, but in any case, I found him deep, engaged and attentive. Whatever the topics we discussed (the nature of espionage, truth or the mind), each time it was incredibly powerful. However, we did not necessarily have our views on things.

Particularly on history or truth.

Yes, it’s true. But I like his view of history as chaos. People are obsessed with conspiracies. They imagine that behind the scenes someone is pulling the strings and manipulating everything. It’s reassuring to hear David explain that history is not necessarily the product of successive plots, but perhaps just the result of different human follies. Hearing him talk about human madness and reminding us that history is only the addition of chaotic elements was important for me. Because history is also confusion, errors, chance.

This is the parable of the pigeon tunnel (In his book, John Le Carré recounts that as a child, in Monte Carlo, he saw hotel guests shoot pigeons coming out of a tunnel. The spared birds returned to their starting point before, a few days later, re-using the tunnel Editor’s note).

That’s it. There are those who live and those who die and it’s a matter of luck. A good story that. David works by parable. He’s a bit like Kafka.

The beautiful thing about this documentary is that you never try to unmask it.

I do not believe it. For me, an interview is a medical office. ” Take off your clothes. Lie down “. I worked privately a long time ago and I made a film – The Thin Blue Line – where I solved a murder. A guy was wrongly accused and I managed to prove that he was really innocent, I was then able to get the murderer’s confession. How ? Not by sitting down and thinking I was going to make him confess, no! By making him talk, by listening to him, by being curious, by trying to find out more. I wasn’t trying to know a thing, but I wanted to know more.

The famous “Who are you?” »

Exactly. So, at the risk of disappointing some people, I never started this film thinking that I was going to “unmask” John Le Carré, as you say. He also admits it himself: “I imagine they want to hear that I hit my children or that sort of thing.” It wasn’t my intention, he knew it.

However, it is paradoxical to be faced with a spy and an author, someone who was, all his life, a creator of fiction, and not to want to know who he really was.

I agree with you: the spy and the author are liars. They both develop a cosmology. But I have the impression that it would be terribly boring to try to “unmask” him. You can imagine me picking up all his books and asking him: “And what did that refer to?” What is real and what is not? » ? Very little for me! Especially since, in literature, the presupposition is that everything is false. On the other hand, I discovered things about him. He was extremely documented, he went into the field. Whatever the subject of his books, he worked. And a man who thinks about fiction necessarily thinks about the world. The world was reflected in his works.

Your documentary is also very moving. I wrongly had the image of a cynical writer and we realize his deep humanity.

And his righteousness. At the heart of his vision of man is the firm conviction that there is good on one side and evil on the other. For example, he tells this story which I find fascinating. While he was in the USSR, he was asked to have dinner with Kim Philby (a famous English spy who turned out to be a double agent) and he refused. He explained that he could not have dinner one evening with the Queen’s representative and the next with the Queen’s traitor. For me, all of David is there. His loyalty, his humor and his righteousness.

John Le Carré: The Pigeon TunnelOctober 20 on Apple TV+ (and Canal+ in France)