Hopefully we were not late to see Badlands by Terence Malick (1973). For me, this kind of movie makes cinema exist. This one is not an other movie; it has something to do with art, the art I prefer, the necessary art. Many of the necessary films I like have something to do with the road, as if travelling was necessary (necesse est). Even if it's from a pool to an other pool (The Swimmer by Jack Perry). I remember having seen Stranger than paradise by Jarmush in 1984, with fellows from the commercial school; they insulted me after the movie. For me, Jarmush was a miracle in the grey 1984 world. Badlands is from the same vein. Both films were screened in the same cinema, "Le Quartier Latin" rue Champollion. After the film we walked in the street; I was absorbed, ruminating the giant Malick's movie. Suddenly I raised my eyes and saw an old marble sign on a house: this was the house where Champollion discovered the secret of the hieroglyphs. It's incredible to have made such a discovery in such an old Paris house, so far from Egypt, so far from South Dakota... In the song Alabama Gay that I wrote for Joseph Whitt's video project, I quote the Badlands, thanks to the english assistance of my co-auteur Noura Wedell.