Filmmaker Laurence Petit-Jouvet on Racial Inequality in France
This month at AUP, we are celebrating Black History month by inviting special guests to share their work and views with students. One of these special guests was documentary filmmaker Laurence Petit-Jouvet, sharing her most recent documentary, La Ligne de Couleur, which tackles the "taboo" issues of race, inequality, and discrimination of non-white French nationals.
Petit-Jouvet asked eleven French non-white participants to write a letter to someone of their choice: imaginary or real, living or dead. "I said to them that the most important thing is that you use this opportunity to deal with your color in a new way for yourself." The letters were then transformed into film, each letter working independently from the others, with it's own unity and visual style. For example, one video letter uses childrens' drawings to show the story, while another is made in an apartment using multiple cameras. In these video letters, we see the deep hurt and discrimination that the participants face on a daily basis.
Image credit: 'La Ligne de Couleur'
At the end of the screening, there was a Q&A with Petit-Jouvet, in which she shared her reasons for making this documentary. She explained, "I wanted to make this film because I think the French situation is just unbearable. Even though I’m white and I don’t have to suffer from my skin color, I can't stand what I see." Petit-Jouvet went on to explain that the consequences of this discrimination are very costly socially, because pain floating over a country "is like a cancer".
Image credit: 'La Ligne de Couleur'
Another aspect to the racial problem that Petit-Jouvet believes is specific to France is that the subject is considered taboo. She claims that, "contrary to the United States where you can talk about racial problems, where you have whole university departments dedicated to color studies, in France it’s supposed to be a republic: equality, liberty, and fraternity. Under these large principles the reality is very different. So I think that’s why I wanted to make this film. I think given the situation and what’s happening in France nowadays, it is more and more important to face the reality that France is very unequal racially."
Check out the trailer for the documentary below (in French).
