Director Rachid Bouchareb presents out of competition Our Brothers at Cannes. Behind this title, there are two identities: Abdel Benyahia and Malik Oussekine, both killed by police on the night of December 5 to 6, 1986. One died from a bullet fired by a drunken inspector. The other under beatings on the sidelines of one of the demonstrations against the Devaquet university reform project, a movement in which he did not, however, participate.
The film features Reda Kateb, Lyna Khoudri, Samir Guesmi and even Raphael Personnaz. It is based on many television archives of the time as if to anchor the story in reality and in the history of France. Our Brothers places two families of Algerian origin more precisely in the France of the 80s, years which saw the left and François Mitterrand come to power.
“It was a moment that marked me a lot, years of hope when we naively thought that we were going towards a new society, of fraternity, pushing back racism. There had been the march of the beurs, the creation of SOS Racisme… and basically the promise that we could all be French on an equal footingremembers Rachid Bouchareb who signed Our Brothersinterviewed by franceinfo. And then, 35 years later, we arrived at another place.”
It should be remembered that after the victory of the left also follows a cohabitation with the right. In the Chirac government, the Minister of Security (Robert Pandraud) and of the Interior (Charles Pasqua) will unite to cover the police institution after the dramas of Malik and Abdel.
Himself French of Algerian parents, Rachid Bouchareb questions us through his new film: why a young boy like Malik Oussekine, French, was not ultimately considered as such by all his compatriots? “This is the big difficult question that is still unresolved in France”believes the director who has more than once challenged the viewer.
Rachid Bouchareb had indeed made an impression in 2009 with Native devoted to the fate of soldiers recruited in Africa, forgotten by the French army. Then, in 2010, with Outlaw on the journey of three brothers against the backdrop of the Algerian war. With Our Brotherstoday, Rachid Bouchareb continues his exploration of memory flaws.
Coincidence of the calendar, another other fiction returns in parallel on the death of Malik Oussekine through the fight of his family to bring out the truth on the circumstances of his death: the series Oussekine by Antoine Chevrollier (dark baron, The Office of Legends) with Sayyid El Alami. It has been available since May 11 on the Disney+ platform.
Our review of the film “Our Brothers”