Themes

Question 1

What was Hubert’s (the actor) background?

Answer 1

Hubert Koundé (Jamal in Métisse, comes from a family from Benin in West Africa but was born in the Paris suburbs.

In interviews in 1995 he was keen, however, to distance himself from the violent and deprived setting of ‘La Haine’ ‘We come from a modest background but we are not poor’. He has a diploma in philosophy, interesting as Hubert is considered to be the ‘sage’ and the most forward thinking of the trio.

Question 2

What was Said Taghmaoui’s background before the film?

Answer 2

Said Taghmaoui, who met K through Cassel, is the closest of the trio to the part that he plays. He is beur from the deprived ‘cité des 3000’ in Aulnay-sous-bois in Paris.

Question 3

Les Keufs

Answer 3

Verlan for flics, or cops

Question 4

Meuf

Answer 4

Femme, woman

Question 5

Rebeu

Answer 5

Beur, or Arabe, or arab

Question 6

nique ta mère

Answer 6

fuck your mother/ mother fucker

Question 7

la galère

Answer 7

pain, chore, hellish

struggle
‘raw deal’

‘Bonjour la galère’ = This is going to be hell
‘Compagnon de galère’ = Brother in misery, fellow sufferer

Question 8

Sans papiers

Answer 8

Illegal immigrants (those without identity papers)

Question 9

What does Martine Beugnet argue is symbolic of the ‘fracture sociale’?

Answer 9

The duality between the daytime banlieues and nighttime Paris.

Question 10

What is symbolic of the cyclical nature of the film and of banlieue violence?

Answer 10

–The film starts and ends with a bavure policier and the unjust death of a banlieursard. Likewise, it begins with mass rioting and it is suggested that riots will commence again as the result of Vinz’z death, a generally liked and popular character in the cité.

Question 11

Why is it noteworthy that the violence increases in the Paris section?

Answer 11

• It suggests that the trio are ‘carrying’ banlieue violence with them.
• It highlights their social exclusion, as their violent behaviour is out of place amongst the bourgeois Parisiennes.

Question 12

N’oubliez pas la police tue

Answer 12

Don’t forget the police kills

Question 13

What could the murals shown in the cité, e.g. a repo of Michaengelo’s famous image from the Sistine Chapel, represent?

Answer 13

• -Highlight the government’s failed attempt to improve the quality of life in the banlieues.
• -Arguably the use of famous ‘rebellious’ scholars such as Baudelaire is an attempt to connect with the banlieurards, however the effect does not seem to be overly successful. This suggests the governments lacked of understanding of how the inhabitants of the banlieues really feel.

Question 14

How does the use of the dolly zoom and the techniques used in Paris accentuate the character’s social exclusion?

Answer 14

–In arguably reflects the character’s uneasiness and feelings of being ‘déplacés’

–In addition, contrasting to the banlieues when the trio were ‘masters of space’ and roamed freely in many plans séquences, in Paris they are dwarfed by the architecture and boxed in.

–The trio’s overly macho and ‘tough’ behaviour seems symbolic of their exclusion. Vinz spits inelegantly and in the art gallery even Hubert, a normally calm character, acts violently.

Question 15

In what way could the character’s affinity with America represent their social exclusion?

Answer 15

–Critics have argued that the banlieursards are attracted to the American culture as it is not French, and they do not feel particularly French.

–American influence is omnipresent throughout the film, from Vinz’s immitation of Robert de Niro in one of the first scenes, to the youth’s comparison to the policeman lost gun to weapons used in Mel Gibson’s ‘Lethal Weapon’.

–This influence is also found in the multicultural soundtrack

Question 16

bourgeois-bohème, bobo

Answer 16

péjoratif- fashionable middle-class lefty

Question 17

What is significant about the part of Paris the trio finds themselves in?

Answer 17

It’s close to the Rue de Rennes, leading to the Saint-Germain-des-Prés, the heart of bourgeois-bohemian Paris.

Question 18

How are the two halves of the film split orally?

Answer 18

The estate was filmed using stereo, with broad sound, whereas Paris using mono.

However this doesn’t really come across. Even so, there is a greater density of sound in the cité. Dialogue is richly surrounded by a background of voices, noises, faint music and other diegetic sounds.

In addition, use of non-diegetic sound also contributes in the cité part of the film. The amplified sound of trains hissing, cars howling of guns firing often acts symbolically (the gun in particular as a method of foreshadowing) and adds to the climate of violence.

Question 19

What would you argue is the significance of the world motif?

Answer 19

They motif of the the earth appears several times in the film:

• -At the start where a handmade bomb is thrown at it.
• -(Sort of) Where the trio hear a story about the candid camera (the wall behind says ‘L’avenir c’est nous)
• -This links to the ironic post of the world which says ‘Le monde c’est à vous’ which Said changes to ‘à nous’.

This motif could reflect the theme of ‘La chute de la socieité’ or as it would seem, the fall of the world in general. The constant assertion that the earth is their mocks the defavorisé, because it clearly isn’t, or if it is theirs, it isn’t worth having.

Question 20

‘The heroes of ‘La Haine’ exist in a social vacuum where there are no possibilities of exchanges or encounters.’
Vincendeau

Answer 20

Les héros de ‘La Haine’ existent dans un vide social où il n’y a aucun de possibilités des échanges ou rencontres.

The heroes never meet in cafés, restuarants or even a job centre. They do not belong to a school or workplace, the only representation of employment is Hubert’s drug deal.

Question 21

Makome blunder

Answer 21

Makome bavure

Question 22

Motherfuckers, we are locked in outside!

Answer 22

Nique sa mère, on est enfermés dehors!

Question 23

Thoiry

Answer 23

A local safari park near Paris.

Question 24

What film does ‘the world is yours’ poster reference?

Answer 24

Scarface

Question 25

When Said tries to turn off the Eiffel tower, what film is K referencing? What is the purpose of this shot?

Answer 25

It could be a reference to a similar scene is Eric Rochant’s ‘Un monde sans pitié’.

As well as adding a comedic element and playing on dramatic irony (‘that only works in films’) it could also further symbolize their lack of power, their lack of acceptance in central Paris, or continue the idea that they are ‘ordinary’ banlieursards.

Question 26

What does Vincendeau argue that the exchange between Said and Vinz’s sister references?

Answer 26

The amusing exchange where Vinz’s sister continues to ask ‘pour quoi faire?’ alludes to a sketch by French television comics ‘Les Inconnus’.

Question 27

How does K’s presentation of violence differ from that of American films? according to Olivier Séguret?

Answer 27

According to Séguret, ‘where an American film would not have hesitated to spectacularise violence, Kassovitz of the contrary develops a mise en scène which while being admittedly ‘speeded-up’, is in the end very sober.

One could argue that this is due to the film’s low budget, or because it allowed the audience to focus on the reasons behind the violence and not simple the spectacle of the violence itself.

Question 28

What is Said’s joke about Le Pen?

Answer 28

‘le pénis de Le Pen à peine il se hisse’ (Le Pen’s penis can hardly get-up)

–Said’s ‘tchatche’

Question 29

Roger Ebert: ‘Perhaps they like US culture because it is not French, and they do not feel very French, either’

Answer 29

‘Peut-être ils aiment la culture Américain parce qu’il n’est pas français, et ils ne se sentent pas très français, non plus’

Question 30

A zeitgeist film

Answer 30

zeitgeist: the defining spirit or mood of a particular period of history as shown by the ideas and beliefs of the time.

Question 31

Keum

Answer 31

Mec, bloke

Question 32

foreshadowing

Answer 32

présage