The New Face of Political Cinema: Commitment in French Film since 1995 (review)

This book brings together two important facets of French studies, namely cinema and politics. As Martin O’Shaughnessy rightly points out, the new wave of political films under discussion is thematically and formally different from earlier trends. This is why, before concentrating on recent changes, he sets the scene in an enlightening contextual chapter on political cinema in France complemented by useful illustrations from post-1968 films such as Godard and Gorin’s Tout va bien (1972) and Karmitz’s Coup pour coup (1971). The post-1995 period is presented as the rebirth of ‘committed cinema’ and ‘return to the real’ (p. 2), expressions which are possibly problematic translations for cinéma engagé and le réel. Here are central concepts in French culture, albeit difficult to capture in English. Similarly, distinctions tend to remain rather implicit when using ‘political’, ‘militant’, ‘engaged’ and ‘committed’ to qualify the films and directors. O’Shaughnessy’s main argument is that recent films engagés present fragmented stories of marginalized individuals and symbolic geographical settings, rather than the more universal narratives of solidarity traditionally associated with the genre. He is particularly concerned with filmic responses to aggressive, neo-liberal capitalism, and shows effectively that the dramaturgy of class has been shattered due to the ‘collapse of totalizing left-wing narratives’ and ‘the weakening of the nation’s symbolic protection’ (p. 3). His analysis is aptly articulated around influential French theoretical frameworks, including the work of Etienne Balibar and Jacques Rancière. It is also usefully informed by the critical debates of Cahiers du cinéma and Positif. The book is particularly engaging in its exploration of the strategies mobilized to replace the politics of the past and open up possible future channels. The films under scrutiny restore an oppositional political voice in cinema, and provide visibility to social suffering and struggle. The argument develops around an ‘aesthetic of the fragment’ (p. 99), and highlights the functions fulfilled by motifs borrowed from banlieue film and melodrama. The main conclusion calls for a constructive interpretation of the recent evolution of French political cinema, emphasizing how it restores eloquence and visibility to the socio-political struggle, including a capacity to configure the real, a sense of value, ethical agency and resistance to spatial dislocation (pp. 181–182). O’Shaughnessy has selected a wide range of relevant films to illustrate his carefully constructed progressive argument. The analyses involve established directors such as Bertrand Tavernier and Robert Guédiguian as well as newcomers of the 1990s sometimes labelled the ‘Young French Cinema’, including Matthieu Kassovitz, Laurent Cantet, Bruno Dumont, Erick Zonca, Dominique Cabrera and Laetitia Masson. Significant space is rightly devoted to the Belgian Dardenne brothers who, like most of the other names mentioned, have received insufficient critical attention in English. Some of the films, which are unfortunately unavailable outside France, are suitably introduced prior to discussion, and the book may even help to provide wider access to them. It will certainly appeal to anyone interested in a cinema that engages with the real world.