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<h2>wsws.org: #MeToo collaborates with fascistic forces to block
showing of Polanski’s film <em>J’Accuse</em></h2>
<h5> 15 February 2020 </h5>
<p>On Thursday, the board of France’s César film awards collectively
resigned after coming under relentless attack from the #MeToo
campaign and the French government for nominating Roman Polanski’s
film on the Drefyus Affair, <em>J’Accuse</em>, for 12 awards at
the upcoming February 28 ceremony.</p>
<p>The Dreyfus Affair remains a critical dividing line in French and
European politics. It was a 12-year struggle to clear Captain
Alfred Dreyfus, a French Jewish officer falsely convicted of
spying for Germany in 1894. France came to the brink of civil war
between defenders of Drefyus, led by Jean Jaurès and the socialist
workers movement, and the <em>antidreyfusards</em>—the Army
general staff, the Church and the anti-Semitic <em>Action
française</em> led by Charles Maurras. Dreyfus was ultimately
cleared and the conspiracy to frame him definitively repudiated in
1906.</p>
<p>The <em>Action française</em> went on to provide the ideological
foundations, and much of the personnel, for the collaborationist
Vichy regime during World War II, which oversaw the deportation of
a quarter of French Jews to Auschwitz and other Nazi extermination
camps.</p>
<p><em>J’Accuse</em> is a powerful, compelling film about this great
opening battle in the struggle between socialism and fascism in
the 20th century. It brings to life Colonel Marie-Georges
Picquart, an officer who overcomes his anti-Semitic prejudices as
he finds decisive proof of Dreyfus’s innocence and provides
evidence central to efforts by the renowned novelist Émile Zola to
clear Dreyfus. A highlight of the film is the reading of much of
Zola’s open letter to the president of the Republic, “J’Accuse” (I
accuse), indicting top army officers who lied to frame Dreyfus.</p>
<div class="imageFull" style="width:480px; oveflow:hidden;"><img
src="https://www.wsws.org/asset/ac65592e-f429-4206-ac1b-7803bb9322bH/image.jpg?rendition=image480"
style="width:480px;" width="480"><span><em>J’Accuse (An Officer
and a Spy)</em></span></div>
<p>This is among the greatest films made by Roman Polanski, a
Franco-Polish Jewish director whose distinguished filmmaking
career now spans more than a half-century. Born in Paris in 1933
and raised in Cracow, Polanski lived through the imprisonment of
his parents and sister in Nazi death camps in World War II, as
well as the murder of his wife, actress Sharon Tate, in 1969.
After pleading guilty to unlawful sex with a minor, Samantha
Geimer, and serving 42 days in jail in 1977, he fled the United
States when a judge threatened to unlawfully break the terms of a
plea deal. Since then, he has been mercilessly pursued by US
police authorities and feminist groups.</p>
<p>There is nothing legitimate about the campaign to suppress <em>J’Accuse</em>.
The legal and political consequences of such censorship extend far
beyond its impact on Roman Polanski. By attacking <em>J’Accuse</em>,
the #MeToo campaign is serving as an instrument of a reactionary
attack on freedom of expression and working to install official
state censorship of filmmaking and promote a repressive political
atmosphere.</p>
<p>From the beginning, the #MeToo campaign against <em>J’Accuse</em>
had a fascistic odor. Just before the film came out in November,
actress Valérie Monnier suddenly published unsubstantiated
accusations, which she had already discussed privately with state
officials for a year, that Polanski had raped her in 1975. #MeToo
groups then claimed that those seeing or expressing interest in
the film were “complicit” in rape. Given the vast historical
weight of the Dreyfus Affair, this is tantamount to asserting that
anyone with left-wing views in France supports rape.</p>
<div class="imageFull" style="margin:15px 0;"><a
href="https://mehring.com/product/why-are-they-back-historical-falsification-political-conspiracy-and-the-return-of-fascism-in-germany/"
target="_blank" style="display:block;"><img
src="https://www.wsws.org/en/media/photos/legacy/campaigns/why-are-they-back-ad.jpg"
style="float:none; width:100%; max-width:490px;"></a></div>
<p>The film shot to the top of the French box office despite #MeToo
attacks against it and criticism from several ministers. And so,
when the #MeToo movement objected last month to the César board’s
decision to name <em>J’Accuse</em> for awards, including best
picture and best director, President Alain Terzian dismissed the
objections. He stated: “The César awards are not an institution
that must have moral positions. Unless I am wrong, 1.5 million
French people went to see this film. Ask them.”</p>
<p>#MeToo responded by stepping up its offensive against <em>J’Accuse</em>.
The “Dare To Be Feminist” association, closely linked to Macron
and to Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s Unsubmissive France party, circulated
a petition demanding the César board “not give awards” to <em>J’Accuse</em>.
It asserted: “Two years after #MeToo, while in the United States
Harvey Weinstein faces life in prison, in France we are acclaiming
and celebrating a violent pedocriminal who is on the run.”</p>
<p>A group of 400 film artists, including director Bertrand
Tavernier and actor Omar Sy, regrettably signed a statement
supporting #MeToo’s call to totally restructure the Césars.</p>
<p>César President Terzian briefly tried to save his position by
deciding that the organisaton would recruit hundreds of women to
the board and implement a strict female-male parity in awards and
positions. But denunciations of Polanski as a “rapist” and against
the Césars for promoting “rape culture” kept raining down, until
the entire leading body of French cinema was thrown out.</p>
<p><em>J’Accuse</em> has no distributors in either America or
Britain, where #MeToo has effectively banned it. After attending a
secret showing of the film in Britain, John R. MacArthur of <em>Harper’s
Magazine</em> wrote: “So dangerous is the potential backlash of
collaborating with Polanski that no British or American
distributor will risk showing the movie, which opened to great
acclaim and box office success in France... No one, including my
hosts, wants to be stoned on Twitter or picketed in their place of
business.”</p>
<p>#MeToo’s role exposes the interaction of petty-bourgeois identity
politics with the agenda of capitalist governments. Promoting
gender politics in opposition to class politics, #MeToo has
relentlessly moved to the right.</p>
<p>Macron has reacted to 16 months of mass strikes and Yellow Vest
protests against its overwhelmingly unpopular pension cuts and tax
cuts for the rich by cultivating far-right police forces to
assault protesters. Since Macron hailed France’s
Nazi-collaborationist dictator Philippe Pétain as a “great
soldier” in 2018, police have arrested over 11,000 people, wounded
nearly 5,000 and killed two.</p>
<p>Knowing itself to be hated, the Macron government is seizing upon
#MeToo to promote censorship and build a middle class base for its
repressive policies. #MeToo has not criticized growing police
assaults on protesters. Instead, it has demanded stepped-up state
control of public life and an increase in the proportion of
better-paid jobs given to women.</p>
<p>Just after the César award nominations were announced, Woman-Man
Equality Minister Marlène Schiappa toured the media to orchestrate
the attack on <em>J’Accuse</em>. Asked on LCI whether the Césars
are “complicit in rape culture,” Schiappa said French cinema has
not “matured in terms of sexist and sexual violence towards
women.” She said she was “shocked” at Terzian’s defense of <em>J’Accuse</em>
and that she would be “indignant” if the film won awards.</p>
<p>Through #MeToo’s attack on Polanski and the disciplining of the
Césars, the French government is targeting all cinematic
expression of left-wing opposition. Schiappa denounced Ladj Ly,
the Franco-Malian director whose film <em>Les Misérables</em> on
police violence in working class neighborhoods is named for 11
César awards. Claiming there is “no difference” between Polanski
and Ly—that is, that Ly should not receive any awards,
either—Schiappa said she was “surprised” that Ly is “praised to
the skies.”</p>
<p>Culture Minister Frank Riester, whose ministry sought to publish
the writings of the nationalist and fascistic figure Charles
Maurras in 2018, hailed the ouster of the Césars board over <em>J’Accuse</em>
as a “wise decision.”</p>
<p>#MeToo is a reactionary petty-bourgeois movement providing
“feminist” cover for far-right, racialist forces. It is worth
noting that three of #MeToo’s main targets in the movie
industry—Harvey Weinstein, Woody Allen and Polanski—are Jewish.</p>
<p>Alex Lantier</p>
<h3
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<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 21-02-2020 09:05, A.OUT wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:853260a7-1ec8-c93a-323a-97e3bd8a8dca@ziggo.nl">(Debat?!
Polanski is wereldklasse|!)
<br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohbrCbefoRY">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohbrCbefoRY</a>
<br>
J'ACCUSE - Roman Polanski - Officiële NL trailer
<br>
8.578 weergaven
<br>
•22 okt. 2019
<br>
<br>
Delen
<br>
Opslaan
<br>
Cinéart Nederland
<br>
46,4K abonnees
<br>
Voor meer informatie: <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.cineart.nl/films/jaccuse">https://www.cineart.nl/films/jaccuse</a>
<br>
<br>
Omstreden Polanski-film in Nederlandse bioscopen, ná debat
<br>
14 februari 2020 12:55
<br>
Laatste update: 14-02-2020 12:55
<br>
<br>
Door ANP
<br>
<br>
J’accuse, de nieuwe film van Roman Polanski, wordt waarschijnlijk
in april uitgebracht in de Nederlandse bioscopen. Distributeur
Cinéart gaat de film aan theaters aanbieden, maar pas na een groot
publiek debat over de vraag of de film wel vertoond zou moeten
worden gezien het seksuele wangedrag waar de regisseur voor is
veroordeeld.
<br>
<br>
Dat openbare debat moet plaatsvinden in Amsterdam. Voor het
gesprek worden voor- en tegenstanders van vertoning van de film
uitgenodigd, laat een woordvoerder van Cineárt vrijdag weten. “We
willen de ruimte bieden aan het debat wat er zwaarder weegt: de
kunst of het gedrag van Polanski.”
<br>
<br>
De filmmaker werd in 1977 in de VS veroordeeld voor seks met een
13-jarig meisje. Sindsdien woont hij in Europa, omdat hij in
Amerika direct zou worden opgepakt. Intussen hebben meerdere
andere vrouwen Polanski beschuldigd van verkrachting. Tegelijk met
de lancering van J’accuse dook een nieuwe beschuldiging tegen hem
op. Een Franse vrouw zegt dat ze door Polanski is verkracht in de
jaren zeventig.
<br>
<br>
De titel J’accuse verwijst naar de open brief van Émile Zola tegen
de veroordeling van de Frans-Joodse officier Albert Dreyfus die in
1894 ten onrechte werd beticht van spionage. Volgens veel
recensenten is de film een meesterwerk. Cineárt wil J’accuse
sowieso aanbieden via het streamingplatfom Picl, zodat Nederlandse
filmliefhebbers de film zelf thuis kunnen zien.
<br>
<br>
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