SSC Film Studies

These two scenes show that the image of pars is not all that it seems and that we actually need to study in depth to see what actually lies in the Paris underbelly the opening scene and the art gallery scences are great scces to show this.

La Haine challenges the audience expectations throughout the entire film as it was written

by Kassovitz to comment on the social position of non-French people in the projects. This being said there are certain scenes that attempt to challenge expectations more than others. The montage scene at the start was used by Kassovitz to present the 'real' Paris and not the unrealistic representation that we are fed through the media and other films such as Amelie which present Paris as bright, beautiful and the city of love. The montage shows real footage of riots and police brutality in Paris over a 10 year time gap but it is edited as if it all happened the previous night. Kassovitz does this to try to link the montage to the storyline as it is based the day after a young non-French male is killed during a riot. There is a certain shot in which a group of peaceful protesters dance in front of the police, not doing any harm but trying to voice their opinion. The shot then cuts to a different shot in which a policeman throws a rock at rioters in the distance. He is seen to be 'dancing' as well but in an aggressive and aggravated way which  proposes that he is actually enjoying the violence. The shots are edited together to look like they are the same event when in actuality they could of been years apart. This attempts to challenge the audiences expectations as they may not have known about the riots as they haven't been shown in the media to the extent that La Haine showed it.

This is shown in particular in the art gallery scene, where the issue of social class is presented. As Vinz, Said and Hubert live in the Les Banlieues, the poorer side of France, they are judged and outcasted at this middle-class event. They become the centre of attention as they are different; they are destructive and don’t speak in a formal manner. The media scene, where Vinz, Hubert and Said are confronted by a journalist also shows this social issue. The journalists are looking for something specific, which is shown how they reverse backwards and question the trio about the riots. They are looking for under class people, who are associated to be the cause of the riots. Vinz, Hubert and Said are causally taking drugs and sitting in a park showing they are unemployed and have no prospects, which is exactly what the media are looking for. They antagonise Vinz in particular and record the footage which will be broadcasted later to the public; they portray the underclass as rude and obnoxious. The area around them is bleak and cage like, which represents them as animalistic which is reinforced by the media recording the footage of them. The trio are shot at a low angle to show that this is their environment, this is where they are in control.

These scenes really gives a more realistic view of what Paris is and that it is not all romance and niceness but that it can have a darker side to it that wants to be pushed back into a cage and locked up. But this really at least tries to express that there is a problem in Paris and that it is not all that it seems.