Prize for best Quebec film at the last Cinemania festival, last November, Breatheby director Onur Karaman, is a thriller that tackles the themes of immigration, latent racism, social and economic inequalities quite head-on.
He has white skin and light eyes, but Onur Karaman witnessed the path strewn with pitfalls his father had to go through when he left his native Turkey to start a new life in Montreal in 1990. He was then 8 years old. As he grew older, he admits to having been himself “inhabited by anger”, a bit like the protagonists of Breathe.
His fourth feature film focuses on the fate of a family of Moroccan origin, who lives in a working-class neighborhood of Montreal, and who is struggling to make ends meet.
The father, Atif (Mohammed Marouazi), an engineer by training (like Onur’s father!), cannot find a job in his field. In the meantime, he manages a small restaurant (Chicken with garlic). His 15-year-old son, Fouad (Amedamine Ouerghi), responds to all provocations… Impulsive, he finds himself involved in all sorts of stories.
In the same neighborhood is Max (Frédéric Lemay), a young Quebecer without stature, who works in a Videotron call center, while waiting… The only person he sees is his cousin Jérémie (Guillaume Laurin), openly racist , a mechanic in his father’s garage.
So much for the pedigree of the main characters of Breathe who, thanks to the magic of cinema, will be reunited. For the worst.
Rage as a driving force
This rage, lurking in the characters of Atif or Fouad, but also Max and Jé, was inspired in Onur Karaman by his own experience.
When you’re at the bottom of the social ladder, there’s a funny thing that happens: you have nothing to lose. And to try to climb that ladder, you say to yourself: I’m going to make myself respected in one way or another. I was a very angry child…
Onur Karaman, screenwriter and director
As in the title of his film, he learned to “breathe”. To calm down. “But I know people who have gone in other directions…”, he drops.
The precariousness and despair of the characters (regardless of their origin), who are in search of a brighter future, could have brought them closer. However, it is not. And the discrimination, even mistrust and fear of “the other”, even if it is more obvious on the side of the character of Jérémie, is also expressed by that of Atif, who does not feel welcome…
Onur Karaman, who likes to repeat that “the other is us”, would also have liked it to be otherwise, but in his film, as in life, we tend to fall back on our own camp. .
PHOTO MARCO CAMPANOZZI, THE PRESS
Onur Karaman
However, I don’t think we talk enough about the weight that immigrant fathers carry. We, their children, we don’t have their experience. I think they’re doing the best they can, while trying to find a place for themselves in a society that often doesn’t want them… In Atif’s case, that doesn’t excuse him, but it puts things in context.
Onur Karaman, screenwriter and director
What connects the characters of young Fouad and Max? “I think it’s the inability of dads to talk to their sons,” replies Onur Karaman. Max’s father, Gilles (Roger Léger), is loved by everyone, but he can’t talk to his son properly. To transmit love. No more than Atif, moreover, who incites his son to intolerance, a stage just before violence… ”
Onur Karaman also talks about the loneliness of his characters. Whether it’s that of Atif, Fouad, Max or Jérémie…
“It’s a theme that often comes up in my films, underlines the filmmaker of Where Atilla passes. When I lived on the Plateau with roommates, I never felt so alone. When I moved to Brossard, on the South Shore, I also felt alone. When you try to run faster than your shadow to surround yourself, you can feel alone without realizing it. »
love as an antidote
What helped him overcome his anger and his loneliness was his mother’s love, his father’s reason, and later cinema, when he finally “found” his place.
A testimony that resonates with the young actor Amedamine Ouerghi, 19, noticed by Karaman for his “energy”, who played in The side effect and Like heads not chickens before embarking on the adventure of Breathe. “I never thought I would embark on an acting career, he confides to us, but recently, I wanted to see where this environment can take me. I also felt like I found my place. »
Amedamine Ouerghi, of Tunisian origin, but born in Quebec, believes that all people from minorities live in “challenging” situations. The voltages described in Breathe are realistic, he says.
When I read the script, I immediately recognized myself in the character of Fouad. I said to myself: but it’s me!
Amedamine Ouerghi
Ultimately, Onur Karaman deplores “the incompetence in the dialogue of living together”. “Even with friends,” he says. I see today’s youth who really want to show off with social networks. When we were young, we used to say:I’m crazy, you don’t know me, I’m crazy!“But today it goes so much further. I believe that young people need guiding projects, which will teach them a little wisdom. This is what is lacking at the moment in society in general. »
Breathe hits theaters Friday, January 27.