Brussels film brings
gritty reality of Molenbeek to big screen
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[November 24, 2015] By
Barbara Lewis
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - In a
city locked down on high alert, one cinema dared to open
its doors to show "Black" – a tense, violent, thriller
version of Romeo and Juliet set among the gangs of the
deprived Brussels district of Molenbeek, blamed for
fomenting suicide attacks.
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While schools, shops, the main cinemas stayed shut and
authorities hunted suspect Islamist militants, the independent
Aventure (Adventure) cinema in central Brussels put a message on
its website saying it had decided to open its doors in case
people wanted distraction.
A huddle of a dozen people sat down to watch "Black" - a film
that, even before the attacks in Paris on Nov. 13 were linked to
Molenbeek, was an unsettlingly authentic take on life in
Brussels' deprived neighborhoods.
Directed by Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah, two Belgians with
Moroccan roots, it empathizes with those who grow up believing
the color of their skin and the district where they live can
mean they have no future.
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"People think you are a drug dealer or a terrorist. For a lot of
young people, it's difficult to get out of your group of
friends. There are only examples of not getting a job. They
think why should they even try," El Arbi told Reuters by
telephone.
The film, which won an award at this year's Toronto
international film festival, promises to give an acting future
to some of them.
The male lead Marwan (Aboubakr Bensaihi) is from Molenbeek in
real life, as well as in the film, as are three other
characters, none of whom had professional acting experience.
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His "Juliet" - Mavela (Martha Canga Antonio) - is in reality from
Flanders. For the purposes of the film, she is a member of the Black
Bronx gang that hangs out in Matonge, an African area of Brussels
named after a district of Kinshasa, capital of Congo.
Just as Juliet as a Capulet in Shakespeare's tragedy can never love
Romeo, a Montague, Mavela is banned by her peers from a romance with
Marwan, a Moroccan from the rival 1080 gang.
Director Fallah lived in Schaerbeek, another edgy district of
Brussels next to Molenbeek, while El Arbi grew up in Antwerp.
Both had shared "the crazy certainty that they wanted to be
film-makers" and met at film school in Brussels, El Arbi said.
Before "Black", which is based on a book by Flemish writer Dirk
Bracke, the pair had filmed previously in Molenbeek, but until then,
said El Arbi: "It was really the place where nobody shot a movie."
(Editing by Alison Williams)
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