Mixed-Race Dynamics and the French Road Movie: Drôle de Félix (Martineau & Ducastel, 2000)

The second feature film from directors Jacques Martineau and Olivier Ducastel takes as its protagonist Félix (Sami Bouajila), a youthful thirty-something homosexual man of European and North-African descent who lives in Dieppe with his white partner Daniel (Pierre-Loup Rajot).  The film’s narrative begins after his mother’s death; while clearing out her home, Félix happens uponContinue reading “Mixed-Race Dynamics and the French Road Movie: Drôle de Félix (Martineau & Ducastel, 2000)”

Transracial Fantasies in Mathieu Kassovitz’s Fierrot Le Pou

Synopsis: Set in an indoor basketball playing space, the film features two young adult characters: a skinny white boy (Kassovitz) who fancies the girl; an athletic black girl (Fabienne LaBonne) who appears indifferent to the white boy.  It is a comedy without dialogue which relies on the cinematic language of silent films and privileges visualContinue reading “Transracial Fantasies in Mathieu Kassovitz’s Fierrot Le Pou”

Mixed-Race Melodrama: Métisse

Métisse [Mixed-Race] (Kassovitz, France, 1993) adheres to the ethics of beur cinema by reimagining the French nuclear family as black, mixed and white through its central characters.  As a pioneering work it is flawed but, by directly engaging with issues of race, class, gender and sexuality, the film challenges the culturally embedded assumptions of itsContinue reading “Mixed-Race Melodrama: Métisse”

Josephine Baker’s French Films

American entertainer Josephine Baker was the first multigenerational mixed actress to grace French cinema screens in the 1920s and quickly became a star.  Baker’s life and art reflected her multiplicity.[1]  She started off in vaudeville in New York where she achieved success but faced limitations as a designated black woman. Having left the States toContinue reading “Josephine Baker’s French Films”