La Haine: Liberty, Equality, Fraternity: For Everyone?

(Kassovitz, 1995)

Liberty. Equality. Fraternity. Those are the three pledges that the tricolour flag of France promises their citizens. In the 1990’s, a period of substantial migration from previously colonised French nations, these pledges were challenged due to riots and unrest across France. These riots came from the Banlieue districts, specifically the youth who were being victimised by their government and law enforcement. Due to this chaos swamping much of French culture, filmmakers took a stand to voice their anger at this inequality. It was the shooting of a Maghrebian boy, Makome M’Bowole, by a police officer, that inspired Mathieu Kassovitz to write his tale of inequality and unrest across France (Vincendeau, 2012), La Haine (Kassovitz, 1995). The aim for this post is to study Kassovitz’s text and discover how it relates to the civil disorder, how the promise of the French Flag lied to them and how the Banlieue acted almost as a substitute country.

(Kassovitz, 1995)
Originally, the Banlieue were advertised as spaces of luxury but in reality it turned out to be anything but. As Colleen Montgomery explains, the culture within the Banlieue resembled that of “semiotic guerrilla warfare” (Montgomery, 2008) due to a high number of crime reports, drug use and unemployment. The liberty that was promised for these migrants turned out to be anything as such. This liberty then worsened due to the positioning of the Banlieue. They were a substantial distance away from local towns and amenities meaning that residents would have to travel far to get the simplest of goods and Kassovitz reveals this distance from society by never shooting the Banlieue from a distance (Vincendeau, 2000, pp. 312). Because of this lack of French identity, many residents of the Banlieue turned to other cultures to rely on, specifically the American youth. Inspiration was taken from the ghetto cultures such as their dress sense and music choices (Montgomery, 2008).  Kassovitz demonstrates this shift in cultural reliance in a scene involving Vinz quoting Taxi Driver, a popular American film about a frustrated civilian becoming an outlaw, resembling Vinz’s state of mind.


(Kassovitz, 1995)

Running parallel to the issue of liberty, migrants often found themselves surrounded by inequality everywhere they went. As Kassovitz depicts in a scene featuring Said and Hubert being interrogated by the police, the racism on display from the officers hints at the constant bombardment that Beur citizens would encounter on a daily basis due to the neglect from society that has been present for decades (Packer, 2015). However, inequality was found outside of the Banlieue districts. Within these residential areas, aside from surveillance by law enforcement, an argument could be made that equality could be found among the residents themselves. They share the struggles of their predicament and would bond over these situations, looking past race or upbringing. Again, Kassovitz alludes to this in the casting of his protagonists. Vinz is a white Jew,  Said is Les Beurs and Hubert is Les Afro-French. Each of these characters signify a group of typical Banlieue residents and we see their kindred spirit shining through the violence.


 (Kassovitz, 1995)

Perhaps my most significant finding in my research of Banlieue residential areas, the Beur culture and its depiction in La Haine is that the belief of liberty, equality and fraternity that was seemingly promised was nothing but a lie. In fact, the Banlieue acted more as a country that respected these three beliefs than France ever did.

(Kassovitz, 1995)





Bibliography:
Kassovitz, M. (Director). (1995). La Haine [Motion Picture]. France: Canal+.

Montgomery, C (2008) “Lost in Translation: Subtitling Banlieue culture”. Cinephile: The University of Columbia’s Film Journal. Volume 4, 2008 Retrieved from http://cinephile.ca/

Packer, G. (2015, August 31). Life In The Paris Banlieues. The New Yorker. Retrieved from https://www.newyorker.com/

Vincendeau, G. (2000). Designs On The Banlieue: Mathieu Kassovitz’s La Haine (1995). In S. Hayward & G. Vincendeau (Eds.) French film: texts and contexts. London: Routledge.


Vincendeau, G. (2012, May 8). La haine and after: Arts, Politics and the Banlieue. Criterion. Retrieved from https://www.criterion.com/  

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