René Vautier

Breton filmmaker René Vautier (1928-2015) was one of the most radical and uncompromising voices in European political cinema. Acclaimed as “the filmmaker of decolonisation”, he fashioned film into a tool of struggle and resistance against racism, war and censorship. His career was defined by an unwavering commitment to liberation movements and the defence of human rights.

He joined the French Resistance at 16 and graduated in directing from the IDHEC film school in 1948. In 1950 he filmed Afrique 50, the first French anticolonial work, which was banned for more than forty years and earned him a year in prison. After serving as director of the Algerian Audiovisual Centre (1961-1965), he went on to found the Brittany Cinematographic Production Unit (1970). His body of work includes titles such as Avoir vingt ans dans les Aurès, La Folle de Toujane, Quand les femmes ont pris de la colère and Voyage en Giscardie.

This programme brings together four of his most powerful short films: Les Trois Cousins (1970), a stark account of the living and dying conditions of Algerian immigrants in France; Techniquement si simple (1971), where fiction confronts the banality of evil and the responsibility of French soldiers in the Algerian War; Les Ajoncs (1970), a poetic fable of solidarity portraying an Algerian worker in Brittany; and Le Remords (1973), an intimate and confessional portrait of silence and cowardice in the face of racist violence.

Moira Vautier, the filmmaker’s daughter, will present the programme, organised in collaboration with OVNI (Observatori de Vídeo No Identificat), the Institut Français in Barcelona — where Avoir vingt ans dans les Aurès will be screened — and the Filmoteca de Catalunya, which will host a screening of Afrique 50.