THE FADING

Following a violent saber assault that took place in my hometown of Quebec, I was deeply affected when one of the survivors, Rémy Bélanger, was attacked on social networks when he confessed to having forgiven the aggressor, seeing in him an “overlooked by the system”. The public opinion was inflamed against Bélanger, indignant that he chose, so quickly, forgiveness, thus breaking the cycle of violence.

A short film having as its genesis this tragic event, Les battues is a film strongly inspired by my childhood memories in the Quebec countryside. Using a gray and misty winter tinged with onirism as a backdrop, we find Luce, a victim instrumentalized by the masses, trying to reclaim her drama, facing a village camouflaging a manichean mentality acting according to a system of impersonal and insensitive values. I aim to criticize the rise of popular revenge at the expense of the victims when the latter often find themselves without support, while nourishing a reflection on the humanity of these people committing monstrous acts.