Strategies of Resistance in “French Caribbean Cinema”

Abstract

This article examines how resistance has been depicted over time in “French Caribbean Cinema.” By “French Caribbean Cinema” is meant all feature-length films directed by French Caribbean professionals (or of French Caribbean origin) working in the film industry, regardless of race. The aim is to examine how French Caribbean societies are portrayed in films from an insider’s stance. While there are definitely a number of Guadeloupean and Martinican film productions, according to the criteria aforementioned, it is necessary to establish that a specific French Caribbean cinema does exist based on a certain unity, determined by distinct thematic, dramatic, or aesthetic features. The article focuses on films taking place, from an objective duration standpoint, in Guadeloupe or Martinique, that is, twenty-five of the sixty films listed. The different strategies of resistance depicted in that cinema range from the resistance fighters and Maroons against slavery and economic exploitation, to the new résistants fighting against political and cultural oppression through the practice of creolization, as proposed by the Martinican philosopher Édouard Glissant.

Keywords:

• French Caribbean cinema
• figures of resistance
• Maroons
• Édouard Glissant
• Patrick Chamoiseau
• creolization

Notes

1 In the French West Indies, “local” refers to whatever is endemic to Guadeloupe or Martinique, in contrast with what comes from mainland France.

2 Maroon: a slave who has fled to the mountains to escape plantation-based slavery.

3 “Esclavitude” or “slaveness:” a creolized term found throughout Martinican author Raphaël Confiant’s novels.

4 This film stands out from the rest of our corpus as it was made by a film director from the island of Oléron and married to a Martinican actress, living in Martinique and a major collaborator of Negritude poet Aimé Césaire. Regardless, both this film’s topic and characters assert its French Caribbean-ness.

5 Interview of Benjamin Jules-Rosette in Paris on 17 October 2017.

6 In his novels, Édouard Glissant often uses the word “Negator” to capture the Maroon figure.

7 Besides their numerous public interactions and close friendship, this is evident in texts such as Quand les murs tombent (Paris, Galaade Éditions/L’institut du tout-monde, 2007), and L’Intraitable beauté du monde/Adresse à Barack Obama (Paris, Galaade Éditions/ L’institut du tout-monde, 2009), which they wrote together.

8 The aggressive Group for National Organisation of Guadeloupe (GONG), whose influence dwindled after the May 1967 massacre (when armed forces shot and killed several dozens of strikers), as well as a number of bombings throughout the 1980s, mirror the strong move for independence that rattled the French West Indies during that time period.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Guillaume Robillard

Guillaume Robillard earned his Ph.D. in Film Studies from the Panthéon-Sorbonne University. During his research, he wrote several articles on “French Caribbean cinema.” He also created an exchange program at Columbia University (thanks to the Alliance Program). Formerly a student at a film school, he directed a full-length documentary, “Poetics of Diversity,” on the works of the Caribbean author Édouard Glissant, broadcast on French public television and at many festivals.