We saw films that showed us the mountain on a level that was sometimes metaphysical, sometimes purely physical, sometimes a little narcissistic, sometimes very generous, sometimes altruistic, sometimes purely aesthetic, … we could go on at length enumerating the criteria of the categories of feelings that the mountain gives us. There is an abyss between The Mongolian Rider and a young steep skier, and yet there is something in common, and this is how I will conclude: this common thing is what we have been denied for a year. From an administrative point of view, this festival should be forbidden in France because we saw people smiling, glances in the eyes, conversations at the table in the midst of the din and noise, friendship instead of personal detestation and permanent demands, grace, beauty, kindness, welcome… I don’t understand why the central administrations don’t start regulating this festival. Perhaps it should not be publicised too much and its existence should not go beyond the framework of this valley. And then the second very particular thing that this festival and its jury have transmitted, that the volunteers who welcomed us have transmitted, this thing which has been completely abnormal for a year now and which makes the common definition of all these impulses which carry us all towards the mountain. We have witnessed, we have experienced, we have celebrated by going to the mountains and by watching these films, a festival of the living. Because for a year it was explained to us that health should be the horizon of humanity and the goal of our lives, forgetting that to have health there is something superior called life.

Sylvain Tesson at the closing ceremony of the first edition of the Chamonix Film Festival, on 13 June 2021.