{"id":16535,"date":"2014-10-23T05:06:21","date_gmt":"2014-10-23T03:06:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/praag.org\/?p=16535"},"modified":"2014-10-23T05:06:31","modified_gmt":"2014-10-23T03:06:31","slug":"no-english-distribution-for-popular-french-movie-because-of-racism-fears","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/praag.org\/?p=16535","title":{"rendered":"No English distribution for popular French movie because of ‘racism’ fears"},"content":{"rendered":"

French film \u201cSerial (bad) weddings,\u201d or \u201cQu\u2019est qu\u2019on a fait au bon Dieu\u201d – seen by more than 12 million people<\/a> in France so far this year – will not make it to the United States or the UK because distributors have described it as racist and politically incorrect. <\/a><\/p>\n

The film is about conservative, white, Catholic parents whose four daughters horrify them by marrying men from other religions and ethnicities, including an Arab Muslim.<\/p>\n

American magazine The Hollywood Reporter <\/a>did not mince its words when reviewing the movie.<\/p>\n

\"bon_dieu\"<\/a>It has \u201cnothing to do with quality,\u201d the magazine said. \u201cAlthough the \u201cbad\u2019 is in parentheses, that\u2019s perhaps the best way to describe Serial (Bad) Weddings.\u201d<\/p>\n

Variety magazine<\/a> said the film portrays \u201cracist stereotypes\u201d and feeds into \u201cFrance\u2019s ambient xenophobia.\u201d<\/p>\n

James Chapman – professor of film studies at the University of Leicester in England, and a media historian – said there were various factors behind the rejection of the movie by distributors.<\/p>\n

A film that might provoke accusations of racism \u201ccan have social and political consequences\u201d in a country, \u201cthough more so in terms of the controversies they generate than any long-term effects on people\u2019s attitudes and behavior,\u201d Chapman told Al Arabiya News.<\/p>\n

He added that some movie distributors can choose not to handle a \u201cracist\u201d movie for fear of upsetting certain groups and generating adverse publicity.<\/p>\n

He said U.S. distributors might shun the film to avoid possible legal prosecution against them.<\/p>\n

In the United States, a person who commits a \u201chate crime\u201d by insulting a person\u2019s race, color, religion or national origin can face a fine or imprisonment of up to 10 years.<\/p>\n

Reacting to the decision of American and British film distributors, Sabine Chemaly, international sales director at France\u2019s TF1 International, said English-speaking audiences \u201chave a very different cultural approach\u201d compared with the French.<\/p>\n

The former \u201cwould never laugh at blacks, Jews or Asians,\u201d Chemaly told French weekly Le Point.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThey know that this will immediately create too much controversy at home.\u201d<\/p>\n

French film critics say the movie should not be seen as racist, but as a means to overcome racism in France.<\/p>\n

\u201cNeither Arabs, Muslims, Jews or any other community regard this movie as offensive,\u201d Jean-Michel Frodon, film critic at French newspaper Le Monde and cinema studies professor at the National Institute of Political Sciences in Paris, told Al Arabiya News.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s necessary to deal openly with existing stereotypes if we wish to go beyond them.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added that it was better to let such movies circulate to give an understanding of what is really happening in France, where \u201cracism is still too present.\u201d<\/p>\n

Frodon said the mistake of the producers was to lack subtlety in presenting the different characters.<\/p>\n

The film has been a success across Europe, with more than 2 million<\/a> viewers in Germany. – alarabiya.net<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

French film \u201cSerial (bad) weddings,\u201d or \u201cQu\u2019est qu\u2019on a fait au bon Dieu\u201d – seen by more than 12 million people in France so far this year – will not make it to the United States or the UK because distributors have described it as racist and politically incorrect. The film is about conservative, white, … Continue reading “No English distribution for popular French movie because of ‘racism’ fears”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2961,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[422,3],"tags":[501,10356,2971,10355,157,10354],"class_list":["post-16535","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arts-and-culture","category-news","tag-hate-crime","tag-james-chapman","tag-politically-correct","tag-quest-quon-a-fait-au-bon-dieu","tag-racism","tag-serial-bad-weddings"],"cc_featured_image_caption":{"caption_text":false,"source_text":false,"source_url":false},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16535","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2961"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16535"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16535\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16538,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16535\/revisions\/16538"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16535"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16535"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16535"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}