La Haine, “It’s about a society on its way down, and as it falls it keeps telling itself, so far so good… so far so good… so far so good… it’s not how you fall that matters. It’s how you land.” (La Haine) Beneath the façade of juvenile banter and rowdy misadventures endured by the film’s three main characters, La Haine tells a much deeper story about the complexities of living in the Parisian slums of the 1990’s. The final line of the film above succinctly explains its true message of the ongoing failings in society that occurred before La Haine’s production, during its creation, and long after its release. This is what makes La Haine’s examination of the French political state so fascinating. While it only details a day in the life of three …show more content…
In the years and decades following the release of the movie, French politicians made empty promises to reform police misconduct in poor neighborhoods. President Hollande, elected in 2012 and initially a champion of the lower-class, made promises “to begin registering France’s unmonitored police ID checks against non-white people” that turned out to be empty. Just 10 years after the film’s release, tensions boiled high once more, as historic riots broke out across Paris. Looters and rioters sought justice for harassment they faced from the police in their daily lives. The results of the riots were much like the ones documented in La Haine; nothing happened. Today, France’s epidemic of police brutality is only speeding up the “fall” La Haine referenced 20 years later, and just as the film suggests, while everyone ignores the problems, the fall only gets …show more content…
This is what makes La Haine such a monumental piece in French Cinema and politics alike. Released twenty years ago and intended to be a snapshot in time of the current state of France’s lower classes, La Haine is in many ways more relevant today than it was at the time of its release. Between the turmoil of the recent terrorist situations and the ongoing illegal policing, the suburban communes of France are in a progressively worsening state of disorder. Police are being forced into higher workloads because of the crises, and targeted populations are responding with anger and violence. In the past month alone, the police themselves has begun protesting after months of increased lawlessness in the slums of major French cities.(24, France) The ability for France to control its own people seems to be rapidly wearing away and in the pivotal last few months before France’s election, the fact that figureheads such as former president Nicolas Sarkozy have made claims to have “never seen such an erosion of authority in this country,” (Growing Police Protests) put into perspective the events detailed in La Haine. Twenty years ago, the people saw for the first time how the banlieues were suffering: today, they threaten to burst into
Chicanos and Chicanas are often stereotyped by people based on crude and unfair assumptions but at the same time, these stereotypes are often based on the truth. Movie directors are no exception as they attempt to understand and give representation to entire Chicano/a and Latino/a culture in society. The trailer of the film, La Mission, Che seems to be happy with his life until he realizes his son, Jes, is gay. Che then finds himself in a struggle to accept the homosexuality of his son while at the same time, Jes is struggling to find his own identity and to fit into society. The trailer has distinct ways in how it represents and shows the intersection and issues of gender and sexuality, race and ethics, as well as class. The trailer represents
In the films Paradise Bent, Muxes–Authentic, Intrepid Seekers of Danger and the Gender and Sexuality section of Explorations in Cultural Anthropology explore the identification of gender and sexuality (Croall and Altmann 2000)(Islas 2006)(Boyd and Lassiter 2011). The introduction to gender and sexuaity in the book Explorations in Cultural Anthropology, Boyd and Lassiter (2011) discuss how once a baby is born, they are being socialized “into one of the two ‘appropriate’ roles- male or female” (Boyd and Lassiter 2011: 218). The baby is expected to meet the expectations he/she is born into (Boyd and Lassiter 2011). For example, in the films, it is greatly commented by the muxes and fa’afafines that they didn’t follow the gender ideologies, the
The movie Dope, written and directed by Rick Famuyiwa, follows the story of Malcolm through his senior year of high school in the Inglewood California. He lives in a poor neighborhood, with only his mom, yet he still strives for greatness. He has a couple of friends, and they all love 90’s hip hop culture. They try to do their best to stay out of trouble and away from bullies. Malcolm sees a girl he likes and ends up following her to a drug dealer’s birthday party. When the cops bust the birthday party, he unknowingly goes home with all the drugs and the gun that the drug dealer owns. This sets off a wild chain reaction, as he now has to sell these drugs to payoff the supplier, who happens to be the Harvard Alumni that Malcolm’s needs approval
However, what really frames Francine du Plessix Gray’s biography is not so much the “fin du dix huitième siècle” but the “fin du vingtième siècle” and the “reality” material from Sade’s life that made it possible to represent the Marquis, his sons, his wife, mother-in-law, father-in-law, and uncle as so many of the people who populate the running narrative of criminals, deadbeat dads, incestuous relatives, date-raping playboys, and battered women that fill soap operas, day-time talk, women’s magazines, talk radio, and the tabloids. This paper, then, explores Sade’s biography not as a narrative of (the Marquis de Sade’s) his life, but as a narrative that pleases today’s reader because it serves up a voyeur’s view of (in) his “dysfunctional” family life “at home” that we are all too familiar with. This becomes abundantly apparent when du Plessix-Gray’s rendering of the Marquis and the Marquise’s lives are superimposed over the récit of lives that we read about all the time in the popular press and observe in television soaps and other series. Ultimately, we are interested in what such a reading, writing and representation of Sade’s life does to Sade’s persona and status, both in the world of letters, but more importantly, in the world at large.
Both Kassovitz’s La Haine (1995) and Meirelles’ City of God (2003), utilise distinctive techniques in order to present ideas of power, poverty and conflict, as well as to reflect their urban environments in a particular way. Both directors present conflict between the poor and the powerful through a range of powerful micro and macro techniques to create films which expose the problems related to urban areas, and the context that each was set in, which contributes to getting the messages of their films across and thus has a greater impact on the audience.
Jean Renoir’s greatness is reflected in his concerns about the people living at the bottom of society. Nonetheless, instead of directly depicting them, sometimes he cleverly used the images of the upper-level class people to indirectly reflect them. For instance, as one of the greatest films in the history of cinema, La Règle du jeu in 1938 depicts the moral affectation and callousness of the upper-class French society at that age. In the story, even though Jurieux is invited to La Colinière, he does not belong to the upper-class. Ironically, Schumacher, the gamekeeper who shoots Jurieux to death, is also from the underclass society. Although the manslaughter happens between two men of the underclass society, it is the rules of the upper-class society the culprit of tragedy. On the surface, no one is accused to commit the murder. Nevertheless, what most horrible is this silent kill, and it is done by the upper-class people’s tacit
Dr. Manette is imprisoned in the French Bastille for eighteen years by the cruel French government and unknown to him those many years of pain and suffering serve as a great sacrifice in the eyes of the Revolutionists. He is recalled to life from the time he served when he meets Lu...
The Three Here’s for Cooking The romantic comedy, Today’s Special, expressed the worries of Indian parents becoming at ease. Also, expressed the struggles a parent faces in search of a better life, the passion and dedication going unnoticed in the work field, and the connection between friends, a lover, and family. However, the film centered its attention more on the development of Samir’s “cold” cooking within the Indian food, with the help of Akbar. In addition, the main actors in the film looked the part and associated with the main idea of the culture of an Indian family. For instance, Samir’s appearance showed he had drifted away from his family’s culture and developed a professional understanding and love for the cooking industry.
To escape the invented world that is presented to society, creating a more critical distance is necessary. Instead of allowing the media to use civilization, understanding the meaning and effect it has on them will enhance their perception. This directly correlates to Super Sad True Love Story, in which the populace has to grow through a collapse to fully grasp what is wrong within its society. Similar to The Truman Show, as Truman tries to escape Christof’s manipulations, he is blocked at every turn. The movie hinting to the viewers that they have to take a mental journey to secure their freedom. These cases are evident in the issue of the Paris attacks, reported in the article “Does Paris Matter More Than Beirut?” as the only people that are wondering why Westerners do not seem to acknowledge Beirut are critics. The media therefore draws society in, able to easily deceive and manipulate. As a result, the illusions created by the people ought to be escaped solely by
In the documentary “Fed Up,” sugar is responsible for Americas rising obesity rate, which is happening even with the great stress that is set on exercise and portion control for those who are overweight. Fed Up is a film directed by Stephanie Soechtig, with Executive Producers Katie Couric and Laurie David. The filmmaker’s intent is mainly to inform people of the dangers of too much sugar, but it also talks about the fat’s in our diets and the food corporation shadiness. The filmmaker wants to educate the country on the effects of a poor diet and to open eyes to the obesity catastrophe in the United States. The main debate used is that sugar is the direct matter of obesity. Overall, I don’t believe the filmmaker’s debate was successful.
La Haine is a French film from the 1990s. The film is in black and white camera effect and sets a serious mood and tone. The movie starts off with clips of people rioting and cars being overturned. Right away, you can tell one of the themes in this film will be related with violence. The movie’s main characters are three young men; Said, Hubert, and Vinz. They all were from the projects. Although the three of them were ethnically diverse from one another. They derived from the same background and experienced similar conflicts within the French society. La Haine greatly exhibited how harsh life was for the people living in the projects. The movie revolved around themes such as violence, racism, and the struggle of coming from a relatively poor
I chose to analyze Despicable Me, an animated film geared towards a younger audience, because I was interested in examining underlying theories and messages that this film would be relaying to its viewers. Often times, when watching animated films, children are not aware of these messages, as they are absorbed by the characters, special effects, and humor. But as we have learned throughout this semester, our brains are subconsciously primed by the various surroundings we are exposed to. Since we also studied the impacts of entertainment, such as television and video games, on children, I wanted to see how a popular children’s film might also affect them.
On July 14, 1789, several starving working people of Paris and sixty soldiers seized control of the Bastille, forever changing the course of French history. The seizing of the Bastille wasn’t caused by one event, but several underlying causes such as the Old
Hocus Pocus is a 1993 film directed by Kenny Ortega. It is a very enjoyable movie with a good cast. The movie genre is comedy, horror, and fantasy. The film is based on a story about Garris and David Kirchner. And it is starring Bette Midler, Kathy Najimy, and Sarah Jessica Parker. The story follows the villainous trio of witches, who are inadvertently resurrected by a teenage male virgin. It takes place in Salem, Massachusetts.
Each social class in France has its own reasons for wanting a change in government. The aristocracy was upset by the king’s power, while the Bourgeoisie was upset by the privileges of the aristocracy. The peasants and urban workers were upset by their burdensome existence. The rigid, unjust social structure meant that citizens were looking for change because “all social classes.had become uncomfortable and unhappy with the status quo.” (Nardo, 13)