Voix de son maître
Nicolas Philibert, Gérard Mordillat
1978 - 100 min - 16 mm - Noir & Blanc - France

For Michel Bara, the director of Richier, the title proposed by Philibert and Mordillat for their film ist simply "atrocious". "La Voix de son maître" does of course evoke the idea of a dog and his master. He proposes "Les Patrons" as an alternative. The directors around the table pick up this idea and come up with an agreement on "Les Gagneurs".
The frank and open attitude of Philibert and Mordillat’s film is both analytical and subversive. In proposing their title, their position, and their intentions, the authors succeed in making the complacence of company directors and managers. At the same time the filmmakers manage to avoid any form of conflict with their critics by restraining from comment. In long, uncut and uncommented sequences, the bosses describe their relationship to their employees and the unions, define their relationship to state power and justify their own economical authority.
"La Voix de son maître" is by no means a militant pamphlet. It is rather an analysis of the executives and their attempts at self-justification. The film focuses not only on declarations and argumentations, but also on gestures, intonations, rooms, and even furniture. Some of the directors present themselves as assertive patriarchs at home in their luxurious sofas, while others sit modestly on a simple office chair in their company, conveying the perfect image of competent managers.
With watchful eyes and attentive ear, Philibert and Mordillat succeed in delivering a subtle critic of the complacence of company direc-tors, whose power becomes increasingly equivocal as the film unfolds.