Berlin Film Festival: ‘The Ice Tower’ Star Marion Cotillard Shares She Was “Intimidated By Young Co-Star”
Marion Cotillard shared that, while she plays the enigmatic Cristina in her film The Ice Tower (‘La Tour de Grace’), she found herself intimidated by her young co-star Clara Pacini as the pair prepared to work on the movie.
Cotillard, who won an Oscar in 2008 for her role of Edith Piaf in La Vie en Rose, said at the Berlinale Film Festival:
More from Deadline
“We met at my place and I realised I didn’t dare to look her straight in the eyes, I felt very uncomfortable. I felt intimidated by Clara, she is very charismatic. That was the start of our work together, [that connection] already existed between us.”
Discussing her preparation for the role of actress Cristina, she said: “I invented stories, rivalries with actors, failures and flops. I invented her decline, in a sense.”
She added: “Repeatedly, I play mysterious figures, so I want to see that mystery for myself. I don’t want to find out everything, I want to be surprised by reactions in the course of shooting.
“I let myself be carried along by what is around me on any particular day, including interactions by the other actors.”
Cotillard stars in the fantasy drama directed by Lucile Had?ihalilovi?, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Geoff Cox. The movie premiered at Berlin International Film Festival, Sunday February 16.
In the story set in the 1970s, Cotillard plays enigmatic actress Cristina who is shooting a film adaptation of Hans Christian Anderson’s fairy tale The Snow Queen in which she plays the title character. At the same time, Pacini’s character Jeanne, a runaway teenage orphan, takes refuge in the studio where the film is being shot and falls under Cristina’s spell.
Cotillard said of Had?ihalilovi?’s adaptation from the original fairytale: “I loved what Lucille had drawn out of the Anderson fairytale. I was intrigued by the fact she takes the mirror and replaces it with a camera. It says a lot about the world we live in today. I thought it very profound.”
Of the challenge of playing an actress herself playing an actress within the movie, Cotillard reflected: “Film within film, images within images, having this woman looking at herself through the image of her that is filmed, and also through this young girl, boxes within boxes.”
Had?ihalilovi? said of her decision to adapt this particular age-old fairytale: “Fairy tales are frightening and complex, sometimes they also have a moral aspect. The Snow Queen was one that fascinated me the most.”
Cotillard’s co-stars alongside Pacini include August Diehl and Gaspar Noe.
Following its debut in Berlin, the film will be released theatrically in France by Metropolitan Filmexport on 17 September 2025.
Best of Deadline
Sign up for Deadline's Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Solve the daily Crossword
