There is a false belief that committed social cinema is not interested in spectators. It breaks that dogma the success it has had, both at festivals and at the French box office, Souleymane’s story, a film that looks directly to immigration and the situation of rider that work in the streets of the big European cities. “Confinement arrived and I started seeing all the deliverymen in the streets of Paris, mostly Africans and almost all without papers. I thought that was the issue I had to tell,” says Boris Lojkine, French director of this film.
More than forty awards at different festivals, although of all the most important ones have been the ones that the protagonist has been receiving, Abou Sangare, a young man who spent several casting and ended up being selected for the role, but who did not have papers then. “I arrived in France in May 2017. I carried out activities in associations and, at the same time, one of those responsible called me to tell me that there was a film director who was coming to Amiens to do a casting. I introduced myself, along with 25 other young people from Guinea and we did interviews. I went through the tests and selected me for filming. We made rehearsals and, finally, they gave me the main role.”
Thus he came to star in a film that has made him rub shoulders with stars such as Daniel Craig or Ralph Fiennes, whom he won in the European cinema awards. He acknowledges that he doubted whether or not to take work. Also that he never had much hope that he could roll. I had no papers and that hindered the contract. “I said yes, but at that moment I was not so clear, because I had no papers to work, and the director did not want me to do a black job.” That stumbling also solved.
It was not after the premiere of the film in the French cinemas, when he obtained the allow of residence. He is now a French citizen. “I always said that the film would be finished when Sangare had documents. When we were in Cannes and I saw the success of the film, when I saw that he won an interpretation award, I was sure that he would come out in the press the following week. But it is true that he has taken time. We have a slightly complicated political situation in France at this time. We have taken, but he has already won the documents and it is great,” the director told us recently. “I am very, very happy, I feel free, after having been in a prison inside me. I can walk with my friends on the street without thinking that they will arrest me in a police control,” said Abou Sangare that continues with his profession of mechanic. “I really liked working as an actor, but it is true that it has never been my dream,” he replies if he will continue to make films in the future. “I have always wanted to be mechanical, having a plate of food every day and a place to sleep and be hot. The same if someone calls me to help you in a filming, I will do it, but clear tango that my dream is not to become a star, or be a millionaire. I have other dreams,” he adds.
Sangaré is Souleymane, a young Guinean who travels through Paris by bicycle distributing food. On the back, a huge turquoise blue bag, that nobody looks and weighs. He has no papers, in fact, we see him prepare for an interview to ask for political asylum. Meanwhile, he deals with customers who ask for their services, hurried and rude, with passers -by and with restaurants.
“The delivery man is not just the migrant, the delivery man is an undocumented worker and is someone who tells us so much about migration itself, as well as something very contemporary: the question of this digital economy, of the uberization. There is a crossing of the two issues in the figure of the delivery man,” says the director who denounces the labor exploitation, which usually affects those who cannot complain, or claim, to those who have no other option. “It is no accident that many of these people who work to give requests also be people with an immigration history. It is very striking and tells something about this contemporary world. The film serves as a mirror, holds a mirror with our society. It says a lot about us,” Lojkine insists.
With a style that reminds that trembling chamber of the Dardenne brothers, the parents of European social cinema, the director makes us feel the hurry, vertigo and tension of his day to day in the streets of Paris. The Belgian had already talked about immigration in another previous film, Hopewhich tells the history of the trip of two Africans to Europe and ends when the characters avistan Spain. It is not actually accustomed to roll in France and, less, in Paris, a city full of noise, traffic, etc. The story required it and it is in the streets of Paris where we follow the protagonist.
Souleymane’s story It is not a moralistic film. Their characters are not villains or heroes, they are people who suffer from a system that harass them and others who take advantage of cracks and others. The director also portrays how some migrants exploit their compatriots, such as Emmanuel’s character, owner of the Uber East account that is rented for 120 euros a week. It also shows how it is easier to lie than tell the truth to achieve residence and how everything leads us to corruption and despair. “This is an extremely immersive movie that puts you on the skin, in a situation very close to that which Souleymane lives. Living this experience in a movie has nothing to do with seeing a report or reading an article about is spoken of the topic of migration. If you read an article gives you some information, it does not give you the sensations and emotions of all this,” explains the director about the form of the film.
“The cinema has an important role, but for this you have to believe in the cinema that can tell things to the world and tell them in a way that no other means can do it,” he continues. The truth is that your movie is an example of that. “It may sound ambitious to say this, but it happens that you get out of this movie with a very particular emotion.” That emotion, an expert in entertaining political cinema usually says, Costa Gavras, is the one that leads to change the actions of citizens and to convert cinema into politics.
