'Jane By Charlotte ’ Trailer: Charlotte Gainsbourg Interviews Her Mother, Jane Birkin, In New Cannes Doc

Charlotte Gainsbourg is not only a multifaceted renaissance woman, actor, model, singer; she’s also French royalty, the daughter of louche French pop singer Serge Gainsbourg and model/actress/singer Jane Birkin. She’s also now a filmmaker, having made her first documentary, “Jane By Charlotte,” which melds all of these ideas together. Her directorial debut, which will debut at the Cannes Film Festival soon, is a documentary that charts her complex relationship with her mother, Birkin.

Obviously, they have baggage, and tears start to flow in this first trailer rather early (Gainsbourg first became famous to the public for appearing in the unfortunately-titled song “Lemon Incest” with her father, and one could argue you could make the entire doc about Charlotte still being mad at Jane for letting her father endure that). “You were intimidating as a child,” Birkin tells her daughter. Fame has got to be a big part of it, too, as that became part of the entire family’s identity and arguably distracted Birkin as a mother and human being.

Here’s the official Cannes synopsis for “Jane By Charlotte”:

With the tremor of time passing by, Charlotte Gainsbourg started to look at her mother Jane Birkin in a way she never did, both overcoming a shared sense of reserve. Through the camera lens, they expose themselves to one another, begin to step back, leaving space for a mother-daughter relationship to unfold.

“Jane By Charlotte” makes its world premiere during the Cannes Film Festival that kicks off tomorrow. Be sure to watch for our review of this one and all our coverage.