French director Michel Hazanavicius, helmer of the multi-Oscar-winning The Artist and of this year’s animated feature Cannes and Annecy selection The Most Precious of Cargoes, has published a deeply personal piece in Le Monde addressing the increasing occurrences of antisemitic violence across Europe. Based on the novel by Jean-Claude Grumberg, The Most Precious of Cargoes is a story about the transformative power of finding family, set against the backdrop of the Holocaust.
Hazanavicius is descended from Jewish grandparents who fled to France from persecution in 1920s Lithuania and Poland, only to be faced with the genocidal violence of the Nazi occupation in World War II. With more and more antisemitic incidents reported across the continent, as well as North America, in the last year, the filmmaker put to pen his feelings about being Jewish in our current times:
“Why, for some time, do I, who am Jewish among other things, who has never really given a damn, have the impression of being more and more obliged to be Jewish? To react as a Jew, to think as a Jew, basically to be Jewish above all,” Hazanavicius wrote.
In another passage, he questions, “Why, when we put Netanyahu on trial, do I too often hear the trial of Israel, or even the trial of the Jews, instead of simply putting the extreme right on trial… Why couldn’t a Jewish asshole just be an asshole? Why does every Jew who says or does something stupid have to take all his people with him? Why do I feel like, for a while now, Jews are the coolest enemies to hate? Much cooler than the Russians or the Chinese, for example.”
“…Why do I have the impression that when we have succeeded in making the Jewish genocide an event like any other, or a very exaggerated event, or even an event too often exploited by the Jews themselves to justify their power, then the anti-Jewish hatred will be able to flourish in complete peace, in quiet serenity?”
The full piece (in French) is available on Le Monde‘s website.
[H/T Deadline]
