French filmmaker sounds alarm on rampant Racism ahead of election
FRANCE-In an effort to stop the extreme right, award-winning French filmmaker Alice Diop has issued a warning against “rampant racism” in her country and organized a group to encourage people living in housing estates to cast ballots in the next snap election.
Is France ignoring a growing racism problem?
The tagline of the entertainment website Allociné, sometimes known as the “French IMDb” since it is the preferred movie platform in France, encourages users to be “more than just spectators.” The French Filmmakers Society (SRF), which has issued a warning about a coordinated effort by far-right activists to discredit movies that do not support their political agenda, claims that some spectators have accepted this invitation with malicious fervor. The warning comes after Mehdi Fikri’s first feature film, “Avant que les flammes ne s’éteignent” (After the Fire), had a disastrous premiere and was met with a barrage of unfavorable user reviews on Allociné before it was even released in French theaters on November 15.
The SRF, which has criticized a pattern impacting other films that cover themes of interest to the extreme right, most notably immigration, claims that those ratings, together with derogatory remarks in other media outlets, gravely harmed the film’s prospects. A statement released by the SRF last month claimed that Fikri’s film “is currently the target of a violent smear campaign relayed by social media and CNews, particularly on the Allociné platform.” The statement referenced a conservative news channel that is frequently referred to as the French Fox News because of its conservative slant and controversial cultural topics.
Will the election exacerbate France’s racism issue?
Speaking about “far-right raids” on Allociné, the director himself has described them as a component of a “wider campaign of harassment targeting the film.” Fikri criticized “a power strategy aimed at occupying the cultural sphere, waging a battle of ideas, and smearing people who try to tackle certain subjects” in an interview with France Inter radio. The central theme of “After the Fire” is a woman’s pursuit of justice following her younger brother’s unexplained death while in police custody.
The story, which takes place in an outlying banlieue (suburb) of Strasbourg, addresses the ongoing controversy over police brutality in the dilapidated suburbs of France, where residents of immigrant heritage frequently claim to be treated like second-class citizens. The storyline has drawn parallels to the well-known instance of Adama Traoré, a Black man from the Paris outskirts who passed away in police custody in 2016 under circumstances that remain under investigation. The film draws from the filmmaker’s ten years of experience as a reporter documenting social unrest in the banlieues. In the first week after its release, the movie only brought in 18,000 viewers, far less than the anticipated number in this country of movie buffs, where the top 10 grossing films that week all had attendance of over 70,000.
What’s driving the rise of racism in France?
According to theguardian, Diop became the first black female filmmaker to be selected to represent France in the foreign film Oscar nominations in 2022 after winning top honors at the Venice Film Festival for her eerie interpretation of a courtroom drama, Saint Omer. She is regarded as one of the best feature and documentary directors in France. Racism in France was so ingrained in society that it was not being sufficiently addressed during the election campaign. She said that “the deeply racist character” of the National Rally and “the effects on the people who would be victims” were “invisible.”
As reported by france24, The main actress, Camélia Jordana, is a French singer of Algerian descent. She has been a favorite target of the far right on social media since she stood up against racism and police violence in 2020, saying on a TV chat show that she “feel safe in front of a cop” like “thousands of other people” in France. This caused much of the outrage. Fikri and the distributor of the movie claim that far-right parties and media organizations controlled by billionaire businessman Vincent Bolloré, like CNews, are to blame for inciting the ire by falsely depicting the picture as a biography of Traoré’s half-sister Assia Traoré, a leader in the fight against police brutality and racism who is despised by the French far right.
Boycott Pairs Olympics 2024 due to racism
The Racism issue in France is making its root deep in it by the passage of time. Government illness is this issue. No proper arrangements are made for Public. White and black racism is most common in the state. In this situation the Olympics event is also considered racist . So fans and the public should boycott this event.
