AlEx DEsCAs AyO MURDER INPACOT - Doc & Film International

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MURDERINPACOTA fIlM by RAOUl PECK

AlEx DEsCAs AyO

VElVET fIlM PREsENTs IN COPRODUCTION WITH fIGUIER PRODUCTION, APE & bJØRN

WITH THE fINANCIAl CONTRIbUTION Of THE EUROPEAN UNION AND THE AssIsTANCE Of THE ACP GROUP Of sTATEsWITH THE PARTICIPATION Of ARTE fRANCE, CENTRE NATIONAl DE lA CINéMATOGRAPHIE ET DE l’IMAGE

ANIMéE, MINIsTèRE DEs AffAIREs ETRANGèREs ET DU DéVElOPPEMENT INTERNATIONAl, INsTITUT fRANçAIsWITH THE sUPPORT Of sØRfOND - NORWEGIAN sOUTH fIlM fUND, ORGANIsATION INTERNATIONAlE DE lA

fRANCOPHONIE, CIRTEf, bROT füR DIE WElT - PROTEsTANT DEVElOPMENT sERVICE




What inspired you to make Murder in Pacot?

like almost all my films, Murder in Pacot came about as the result of an emotionally-charged, even traumatic, event. The 2010 earthquake in Haiti made me face a reality that I didn’t think was possible in my country. It laid bare both the loveliest and the ugliest facets of the human community. following a brief moment of confusion, the categories of class, sex and racial origin inexorably came back with a vengeance. The end-of-the-world atmosphere needed something cathartic. I had to tackle it in two ways to rid myself of it, via two totally different works, based on diametrically opposed stories which, in reality, form part of a whole. In response to the implacability of fatal Assistance (a 2013 documentary) in unmasking the folly of the humanitarian machine in action in Haiti, Murder in Pacot, following the same radical approach, reveals the distress and abandonment of human beings. faced with facts beyond their understanding, the privileged class could only react with sacrificial cynicism to save itself. They literally “walked” on the dead.

you asked lyonel Trouillot and Pascal bonitzer to help you with the film script?

Right from the start I wanted a story that could be told by three voices or via three characters located in the same place, in a wealthy district of Port-au-Prince. Every day during the shooting of Fatal Assistance, my documentary, I walked by luxurious homes in large deserted courtyards complete with swimming pools that had either collapsed or were completely gutted. Whereas everyone concentrated on the camps, the slums, neighborhoods called “disadvantaged”, few ventured into the plush districts of the rich, whose homes had also been destroyed. from which sprang my desire to explore the flip side of the catastrophe. because somehow, speaking with those who possess everything, dominate everything, direct everything, helps to identify the tensions within a society. Having set up the couple plus “unexpected” guests as the initial premise for the film, I knew that

MURDER IN PACOTInter view with

Raoul PeckJanuary 2015

I had to get to the bottom of the logic of destruction. I knew that there would be a death at the end of the story and that it would be by murder. The only “happy end” possible.With this then as the premise, I stumbled across Pasolini’s book, “Qui je suis” (Who I am), that I had read a long time ago and on which he based his film “Theorema”. He also deals with a decadent bourgeoisie, with heroes at the end of their rope, no foreseeable option for any of them. The trigger would come from the outside. Haiti, year zero.I then asked the famous Haitian novelist, lyonel Trouillot, to work with me on the story, first giving him just a single page explaining the starting point for the film. because of his unique style, simultaneously baroque, brechtian, poetical and incisive, he was the ideal companion for examining the emotional no-man’s land into which my country had been thrown. The french scriptwriter-director, Pascal bonitzer, my usual writing partner, joined us later.

We have the impression that Murder in Pacot could have happened anywhere.

The humanitarian bubble that took shape after the catastrophe could effectively have been located anywhere. Any other enclave following a war. Given the situation, everything appeared to become possible: relationships among people, among social classes, in families and even within a society, with the hope, however clouded, that something positive could result from it. I wanted to understand what was going on behind the walls of the rich, because it’s always more interesting to talk about the issues of a society through those who benefit from it. This story is a metaphor, of course. It’s the abstract tale of a specific reality; in this case, that of Haiti. but it could have taken place in Damas or Oslo. It illustrates the tense relationships among four characters trying to survive. My characters are just pawns in a great societal play. Whence the no-exit….

How did the shooting go?

In the beginning, when I was finishing Fatal Assistance and the idea of writing a fictional film took hold, I didn’t realize how it was precisely the richest families that were going to be the first to rebuild their homes. so all the “beautiful” sets I’d found disappeared one after another in the three years that followed the earthquake. fortunately, we discovered a big white mansion concealed in a large landscaped area whose owner, traumatized by the disaster, never got the courage to go back and see. It was only because of the film shoot that the owner gradually came to accept his home. We’d finally found the spot; it offered ideal conditions for a film shoot in a noisy, bustling city like Port-au-Prince - a quiet, secure and controlled environment where we could film both interiors and exteriors, which is rare. Nature was also important. because the home had been abandoned temporarily by its owner, nature had taken back its rights. birds, lizards, snakes and butterflies had come back and made their nests and hiding places there.

Murder in Pacot also criticizes non-governmental organizations.such criticism is certainly present, but not nearly as much as in my documentary. The film perhaps reveals another emotional element. It is less about denouncing the infernal aid machine and more about probing the soul of a place, of a society after a catastrophe. Meurtre in Pacot is far more

profound. The underlying theme is the “goody two shoes” attitude of the leisure class in relation to the most needy; this is the film’s core message. The kind of arrogance, well-behaved contempt, instinct of superiority of this class, with all the while each and every one playing the role that society has allowed her/him to play. you pretend to obey the rules but you don’t.since the major crises of the 70s, it has become quite clear that the wealthy countries of the world have simply acquiesced to that fact that there will be an “acceptable” level of unemployment and of poverty in consequence, that this situation is going to last and that part of society will have to be sacrificed. some countries have an easier time of it because they possess efficient social aid systems, but even in these nations a certain stabilization of poverty can be observed, a “fourth world” in big, wealthy cities, which is often concretized by the ghettoization of immigrant inhabitants.

Why did you choose Ayo, a singer and Alex Descas, an actor, for your main characters?

It was Ayo’s first role in a film. What I had in mind at the start was to find a woman, more than an actress, who could incarnate the strangeness that I felt was part of the woman’s character. so auditions were focused from the beginning on finding famous black women singers who could act. Ayo with her instinctive intelligence clearly stood out very early on in the process.I’ve known Alex Descas for a very long time; we have worked together, we’re friends. I’ve always kept tabs on his work and consequently didn’t have any doubts about his capacity to evoke the strangeness of the man’s character.both were perfect for this abstract approach to the story; neither of them had, in the end, any color, any past, any exotic particularity.

The woman speaks German at one point….

Many people of this social class left because of the dictatorship, then came back to Haiti to start over again or help out…. That’s what my generation did. That’s where the “international” dimension of the woman, world citizen, comes in, she who finds herself confronted with the reality of her surroundings. With the intention of doing something good: adopt a child… The recognition of failure brought about by the earthquake. but I needed to justify Ayo’s German accent (she is of German/Nigerian origin). It wasn’t hard to establish her German past by giving her a few lines in this language.

What’s next on the agenda?

We’ve just started developing a major documentary project with ARTE based on the work of James baldwin and investigating the race question in the history of the United states today.And then there is my biggest project to date, The Young Karl Marx, about the golden years of Marx, Engels and Jenny Marx in Paris, brussels, Manchester, which led to the drafting of the Communist Manifesto and to the revolution of 1848.This film is scheduled to be shot this year.

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After the terrible January 2010 earthquake in Port-au-Prince, an intellectual bourgeois couple struggles to reinvent a life amid the rubbles of their luxurious home. Needing money to survive, the couple decides to rent the remaining habitable part of the villa to “Alex”, a high-level foreign relief worker. He brings with him in the house, Andrémise, an ambitious 17 years old Haitian girl of modest background. Now the couple, strained by the loss of their social position, their ideals, their dreams and desires must face this toxic intrusion.

MURDERINPACOTA fIlM by RAOUl PECK

AlEx DEsCAsAyO

THIbAUlT VINçONlOVEly KERMONDE fIfI

VElVET fIlM - fIGUIER PRODUCTION - APE & bJØRNHAITI - fRANCE - NORWAy / 130’ / HD / 2014 / fRENCH - HAITIAN CREOlE / fEATURE fIlM

CONTACT PREss IN bERlINDElPHINE MAyElE

+33 6 60 89 85 41 [email protected]

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AlEx DEsCAs AyO MURDER INPACOT - Doc & Film International

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