There is no lack of stylistic ambition and the influence La Haine has had on a generation of video artists and filmmakers like Ladj Ly is obvious. Shot by Aïm in Chanteloup-les-Vignes itself, the stylised monochrome camerawork draws attention to its artfulness with considerable deployment of Steadicam, track and zoom, aerial footage, and saturated black and white images that sometimes veer on the surreal.
#VINCENT CASSEL LA HAINE SERIES#
The script is often very funny as the three lads banter about movies, boast about what they’re going to do next, and get into a series of scrapes. La Haine is serious without being earnest or preachy. Kassowitz pulled out all the stops to distance his movie from any liberal neo-realist films that had gone before.
In the new interview shot for this edition, Kassowitz talks about how the casting of a black man, an Arab, and a Jew as best friends was a "little idealistic" in 1995, but he wanted his audience to get to know them, understand them, and make them more lovable. Kassovitz (himself of Hungarian Jewish origin) was determined to show the mixed ethnicity of the banlieues and co-wrote the script with Taghmaoui whose parents came from Morocco. Saïd (Saïd Taghmaoui) is a hustler cutting deals with local gangs. Hubert (Hubert Koundé) is an aspiring boxer, not so interested in violence but a dab hand at lifting credit cards.
Vinz (Vincent Cassell) is backchatting with his grandma, who wishes he spent more time in synagogue and less time perfecting his Taxi Driver routines in the bathroom mirror. La Haine then shifts to establishing Chanteloup-les-Vignes, a rundown housing project on the outskirts of the city and the three friends we will follow over the next 24 hours. Bob Marley’s "Burnin' and Lootin'" provides the perfect soundtrack opener.
#VINCENT CASSEL LA HAINE ARCHIVE#
Kassovitz sets the scene with an archive montage of the 1993 riots that broke out in Paris after the police accidentally shot a teenager from Zaire in the head while interrogating him about some stolen cigarettes. From the opening image of planet earth being torched by a slo-mo Molotov cocktail to the shocking final moments, this is a stunningly handsome film. It’s hard to believe Matthieu Kassovitz’s blistering tale of three young men fired up by police brutality is now 25 years old as the film has lost none of its incendiary energy and style.