The first scene of the film takes place during a game of Budding geniuses, a famous Quebec quiz game, between two Montreal high schools. We are looking for the name of an actor who played in the play Broue as well as in the series Throw and count. “Claude Legault? », tries a first student. Right of reply to Karim: “Marc Messier”, he replies without hesitation.
The correct answer could have come from one of his teammates: Sanna, for example, or Toussaint, who has a crush on Sanna. Quebec teenagers, we guess, with diverse origins: North African or Middle Eastern, Indian or Pakistani, sub-Saharan or Haitian.
Young people like those I meet at all Impact matches, but who we don’t see so often in Quebec cinema. Young people like my son or my nephew, “swarthy” boys, who accompanied me to the stadium on Wednesday. At halftime, I was chatting with a filmmaker looking for two young Quebec actors of Middle Eastern origin for his next shoot.
This is not an easy task. Racialized adolescents do not recognize themselves in Quebec cinema and do not plan for an acting career; our cinema, which wishes to open up to a greater variety of performers, struggles to find actors from diverse backgrounds for specific roles. It will take time to break away from this vicious circle.
The film, the one with the first scene in a football match Budding geniusesis titled Gamma rays. It was directed by Henry Bernadet (West of Plutowith Myriam Verreault), was released last winter and is available on digital platforms (Crave, in particular).
I’m talking to you about it today, first because it is very successful, then because as the national holiday approaches, it is the ideal film to reflect on the image of Quebec that sends back to us our cinema.
One in four young Quebecers (under 25) comes from a visible minority. We still don’t see it enough on the big screen. Gamma rays presents young people from the Saint-Michel district in their daily lives, their quests, their hopes, their despairs and their irritations.
Toussaint (Chris Kanyembuga), a shy and lonely boy, likes to fish on the banks of the Rivière des Prairies, where he discovers a telephone number left in a bottle. Fatima, cheeky (Chaïmaa Zineddine, a revelation), tries to extricate herself from a cycle of anger and violence. The tranquility of Abdel (Yassine Jabran) is shaken by the arrival from the country of his somewhat heavy cousin, Omar.
Fatima dreams of being free, Toussaint dreams of Sanna being free, Abdel dreams of being free from Omar. They like hip-hop, evenings with friends and white shoes by Çalhanoglu. They call each other “brother”, amaze themselves by going on “world tours” (with a soccer ball), get exasperated in front of their demanding parents and visit the most touristy places in the metropolis in the footsteps of Omar , moved in front of the Olympic Stadium tower: “Look at this beauty! »
PHOTO PROVIDED BY OPALE FILMS
Still from the film Gamma rays
“What are the aliens going to do here?” There is nothing to do. Even we are pissed off! “, says one of the young people in the group to Omar, who claims that the aliens are explorers who, like them, could appreciate the view from the top of the tower.
What does it mean to be Quebecois? They feel or not, to varying degrees, part of this common culture. Foreigners or Quebecers to the extent of their multiple identities, to the way in which they are racialized in the gaze of others or, on the contrary, remain invisible, particularly in our cinema.
In Gamma rays, a refreshing and subtle choral film, peppered with fine poetry, recurring motifs and a cruel truth, I recognized Montreal youth in all its vivacity (and its paradoxical nonchalance). The one I sometimes come across around Beaver Lake – where there aren’t even any beavers, Omar notes, disappointed.
“Mahmoud is not an easy name to bear,” Abdel’s cousin said to his group of friends. “When I arrived, everyone called me Mammoth! » In a parking lot, Fatima confronts a man who has just insulted her mother because she is veiled. “What did you just say?” “, She cries. “I said to take the blanket off his head!” », replies the man.
In a society where Islamophobia is uninhibited, particularly in certain media, and in which a prime minister can, without apologizing or suffering the consequences, blame immigration for a number of social problems, Gamma rays is a reminder of reality. An antidote to the proliferation of reactionary speeches, here and elsewhere.
It is an ultra-realistic portrait of a section of the population too often obscured by the media, despite the efforts and progress of recent years. A polaroid from Quebec now, to borrow the title of the radio show hosted by my colleague Patrick Lagacé, as it really is. Far from the withdrawal of identity, reductive and xenophobic. In a new national affirmation, rich and plural.
Quebec today in three films
Romeo Eleven, by Ivan Grbovic (2011)
A young Montrealer of Lebanese origin (Ali Ammar), suffering from cerebral palsy, tries to find a place in society and find love, despite his shyness. Under a false identity, he begins a correspondence on the web with a woman, whom he agrees to meet in a large restaurant. But how to find the money necessary for this outing? The first feature film, fine, subtle and sensitive by Ivan Grbovic (The drunken birds) is admirably performed by little-known actors.
Offered on Elephant
Felix and Meira, by Maxime Giroux (2015)
Meira (Hadas Yaron) is a young Hasidic Jewish woman, married and mother of a child, who is suffocating in her shackles. Félix (Martin Dubreuil) is a penniless original, fascinated by Meira. Their impossible love story, skillfully directed by Maxime Giroux (Norbourg), is also the portrait of two communities who rub shoulders without knowing each other, and who are completely opposed, in the streets of Mile End in Montreal.
Available on Crave, YouTube, Apple TV, Vimeo, Google Play
Antigone, by Sophie Deraspe (2019)
Antigone (Nahéma Ricci, a discovery), an uneventful teenager, helps her brother escape from prison by confronting the judicial and patriarchal system, guided by her sense of justice. A disturbing fable by Sophie Deraspe (Vital signs, Amina profile) on the difficulties of integrating a North African family in Quebec and on human solidarity, embodied by a tune whistled by Félix Leclerc.
Available on Crave, Videotron, ICI Tou.tv, Apple TV