It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Sunday, July 11, 2021
NDP MPs Call For An Independent Investigation Into Residential School Abuses
(ANNews) – Two NDP MPs are demanding that Canada investigate the allegations of “crimes against humanity” in residential schools.
Mumilaaq Qaqqaq and Charlie Angus have told the Justice Minister of Canada, David Lametti, to launch an investigation into the system in order to bring justice to the perpetrators.
“Enough is enough. Indigenous people need truth and justice,” Qaqqaq said in a press conference. “We need a full and independent investigation that has the power to shine a light on every facet of this national crime and has the power to bring perpetrators to justice.”
“Minister Lametti, don’t you dare tell me you can’t do this. You have the authority. You just refuse to use it and that needs to end today,” she said.
The call for justice comes after the multiple discoveries of unmarked graves at Residential school sites across the country.
It began with the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation when they discovered 215 bodies at a former residential school in Kamloops, B.C. This was followed by the Cowessess First Nation discovery of 751unmarked graves near the former Marieval Indian Residential School in Saskatchewan.
The most recent unmarked gravesite discovery happened last week when ʔaq̓am — one of four bands in the Ktunaxa Nation in B.C. — used radar at St. Eugenes Mission School to find 182 bodies.
From the late 1800s to 1996, Canada forcefully took 150,000 Indigenous children from their home and put them in Residential School Institutions — which were run by the church — where many were believed to be abused by staff and even murdered.
In 2005, 17 private investigation firms were contracted by the Federal Government to investigate the claims of abuse in the system. In 2016, the firms located 5,315 alleged abusers — both former employees and students.
Unfortunately, no criminal charges were laid, and only optional Independent Assessment Process (IAP) hearings were offered. The hearings did not involve the courts at all, but despite this 4,450 out of the 5,315 declined to participate.
“(Abusers) caused possible generations of trauma,” Qaqqaq said. “Child sexual abuse in Nunavut is rampant.”
“There is a reason for that.”
The two New Democrat MPs called on the Justice Minister for the appointment of a special prosecutor to lead the investigation.
“We cannot trust the Justice Department to do this without an independent special prosecutor and international observers,” Qaqqaq said.
The potential prosecutor should be completely funded and possess the power to compel testimonies and documents.
MP Angus said that the Federal Government has enough classified documents to extend the work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
“(The Commission) did not have a mandate to pursue justice, to go after the perpetrators,” he said. “Canadians and Indigenous communities are calling for justice.”
The call for investigations should also be broadened to include other Federal Institutions, such Day Schools and Tuberculosis Sanatoriums, said the MPs.
However, Justice Minister Lametti stated that in order to appoint a special prosecutor, the police must first launch an investigation.
“This is an exclusive power of the police,” Lametti’s press secretary Chantalle Aubertin, said. “We will consider all options that will allow the survivors, their communities and the country to move forward on the path to healing and reconciliation.”
Jacob Cardinal, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Alberta Native News
Billionaire Richard Branson reaches space in his own ship
TRUTH OR CONSEQUENCES, N.M. (AP) — Swashbuckling entrepreneur Richard Branson hurtled into space aboard his own winged rocket ship Sunday in his boldest adventure yet, beating out fellow billionaire Jeff Bezos
The nearly 71-year-old Branson and five crewmates from his Virgin Galactic space-tourism company reached an altitude of about 53 miles (88 kilometers) over the New Mexico desert — enough to experience three to four minutes of weightlessness and see the curvature of the Earth — and then safely glided to a runway landing.
“The whole thing, it was just magical,” a jubilant Branson said after the trip home aboard the sleek, white space plane, named Unity.
The brief, up-and-down flight — the rocket ship's portion took only about 15 minutes, or about as long as Alan Shepard's first U.S. spaceflight in 1961 — was intended as a confidence-boosting plug for Virgin Galactic, which plans to start taking paying customers on joyrides next year.
Branson became the first person to blast off in his own spaceship, beating Bezos by nine days. He also became only the second septuagenarian to go into space. (Astronaut John Glenn flew on the shuttle at age 77 in 1998.)
With about 500 people watching, including Branson's family, a twin-fuselage aircraft with Unity attached underneath took off in the first stage of the flight. Unity then detached from the mother ship at an altitude of about 8 1/2 miles (13 kilometers) and fired its engine, reaching more than Mach 3, or three times the speed of sound, as it pierced the edge of space.
Spectators cheered, jumped into the air and embraced as the rocket plane touched down. He pumped his fists as he stepped out onto the runway and ran toward his family, bear-hugging his wife and children and scooping up his three grandchildren in his arms.
“That was an amazing accomplishment,” former Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, a one-time commander of the International Space Station, said from the sidelines. “I’m just so delighted at what this open door is going to lead to now. It’s a great moment.”
Virgin Galactic conducted three previous test flights into space with crews of just two or three.
The flamboyant, London-born founder of Virgin Atlantic Airways wasn’t supposed to fly until later this summer. But he assigned himself to an earlier flight after Bezos announced plans to ride his own rocket into space from Texas on July 20, the 52nd anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing. Branson denied he was trying to outdo Bezos.
Before climbing aboard, Branson, who has kite-surfed the English Channel and attempted to circle the world in a hot-air balloon, signed the astronaut log book and wisecracked: “The name’s Branson. Sir Richard Branson. Astronaut Double-oh one. License to thrill.”
One of Branson’s chief rivals in the space-tourism race among the world’s richest men, SpaceX’s Elon Musk, came to New Mexico to witness the flight, wishing Branson via Twitter, “Godspeed!”
Bezos likewise sent his wishes for a safe and successful flight, though he also took to Twitter to enumerate the ways in which be believes his company’s rides will be better.
Bezos’ Blue Origin company intends to send tourists past the so-called Karman line 62 miles (100 kilometers) above Earth, which is is recognized by international aviation and aerospace federations as the threshold of space.
But NASA, the Air Force, the Federal Aviation Administration and some astrophysicists consider the boundary between the atmosphere and space to begin 50 miles (80 kilometers) up.
The risks to Branson and his crew were underscored in 2007, when a rocket motor test in California’s Mojave Desert left three workers dead, and in 2014, when a Virgin Galactic rocket plane broke apart during a test flight, killing one pilot and seriously injuring the other.
Ever the showman, Branson insisted on a global livestream of the Sunday morning flight and invited celebrities and former space station astronauts to the company’s Spaceport America base in New Mexico.
R&B singer Khalid performed his new single “New Normal” — a nod to the dawning of space tourism — while CBS “Late Show” host Stephen Colbert served as master of ceremonies.
Upon his return to Earth, he announced a sweepstakes drawing for two seats on a Virgin Galactic jaunt once tourist flights begin.
Virgin Galactic already has more than 600 reservations from would-be space tourists, with tickets initially costing $250,000 apiece. Blue Origin is waiting for Bezos’ flight before announcing its ticket prices.
Kerianne Flynn, who signed up in 2011 to fly with Virgin Galactic, had butterflies ahead of the launch Sunday.
“I think there’s going to be nothing like going up there and looking back down on the Earth, which is what I think I’m most excited about,” she said. She added: “Hopefully the next generations will be able to explore what’s up there."
Musk’s SpaceX, which is already launching astronauts to the space station for NASA and building moon and Mars ships, plans to take tourists on more than just brief, up-and-down trips. They will instead go into orbit around the Earth for days, with seats costing well into the millions. Its first private flight is set for September.
Musk himself has not committed to going into space anytime soon.
“It’s a whole new horizon out there, new opportunities, new destinations,” said former NASA astronaut Chris Ferguson, who commanded the last shuttle flight 10 years ago. He now works for Boeing, which is test-flying its own space capsule.
“This is really sort of like the advent of commercial air travel, only 100 years later,” Ferguson added. “There’s a lot waiting in the wings.”
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
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Dunn reported from Cape Canaveral, Fla.
Susan Montoya Bryan And Marcia Dunn, The Associated Press
Lebanon crisis: Pharmacies go on strike,
fuel shortages cause power cuts
Delivering the dead and helping the living in Myanmar virus spike
Issued on: 11/07/2021
Volunteers carry the body of a coronavirus victim to a cemetery in Hle Guu Ye Aung THU AFP
Yangon (AFP)
Volunteers in white hazmat suits unload a stretcher from a pick-up truck parked in a Yangon suburb and carry their neighbourhood's latest Covid-19 victim towards the crematorium.
There will be no traditional funeral rites, as Myanmar confronts a new and growing outbreak, with thousands of health workers on strike against a February coup.
The State Administration Council -- as the military junta calls itself -- reported more than 4,300 new cases Saturday, up from fewer than 50 per day in early May.
"Before... people were scared to see emergency teams wearing PPE," Tun Khine, one of the volunteers in Hle Guu township north of Yangon, told AFP on Saturday.
"But now, they are looking for us. The situation is upside down."
Tun Khine, a businessman who spoke under a pseudonym, was already a member of a local volunteer group before the pandemic hit.#photo1
Last year they began providing a free taxi service for those stricken with the virus, taking them to hospitals or quarantine centres.
On Saturday the group took seven bodies away, he says -- one from the hospital which was confirmed positive, and six others who were suspected to have died of the virus.
Tun Khine and his team load the bodies into a giant coffin-like box on the back of a white pick-up truck, which bumps down the road, the volunteers riding with it in the back.
The journey ends outside a crematorium, where the body is committed to the flames, with no family members present and without the ritual that is usual in the majority-Buddhist nation.
- 'Of course we are afraid' -
"Of course we are afraid" of becoming infected, says Tun Khine.
"But our bigger fear is our people being infected and risking their lives."#photo2
The team is also struggling to find places that will take the living, he says.
Many quarantine centres stopped operating in the chaos that followed the coup, where mass protests in Yangon and other cities were met with a brutal military crackdown.
Top health officials, including the head of Myanmar's vaccination programme, have been detained by the junta.
Only around 1.75 million of the country's 54 million people have been vaccinated, according to state media.#photo3
At the end of the shift, Tun Khine and his team hose each other down with disinfectant, and prepare for another day of transporting patients and bodies.
But they vow to continue.
"More people are going to die if we stop working because we are afraid," he says.
Sean Penn: Trump 'machine-gunned the vulnerable' during Covid
Issued on: 11/07/2021 -
Sean Penn and daughter Dylan Penn, co-stars in 'Flag Day' which received a standing ovation at its premiere in Cannes on Saturday. Valery HACHE AFP
Cannes (France) (AFP)
Actor-director Sean Penn, who mobilised a huge network to help with the Covid crisis in the US, made it clear on Sunday that he does not miss the Trump administration.
At the Cannes film festival to present his new film "Flag Day", Penn responded to a question about the pandemic response in the United States in typically forthright style.
"When my team and I would come home from test and vaccination sites at night... watching the maddening news, it really felt like there was someone with a machine gun, gunning down communities that were the most vulnerable from a turret at the White House," Penn said of former president Donald Trump's administration.
"We were, not only as a country but as a world, let down and ultimately neglected, misinformed, had truth and reason assaulted, under what was in all terms, an obscene administration, humanly and politically," he added.
Penn, who has a history of highly energetic aid work from Haiti to Hurricane Katrina, used his non-profit group to set up his country's biggest Covid-19 testing site in Los Angeles in the early months of the pandemic.
His group, CORE Response, later set up vaccination sites in LA and Chicago, along with food distribution for affected communities.
Penn plays a very different role in his new film, which he also directed, as a deadbeat father constantly disappointing his daughter, played by his real-life off-spring, Dylan Penn.
He admitted he was reluctant to both act and direct, but was finally won over by Matt Damon.
"The last effort I made to not play it was when I sent the script... to Matt Damon who was generous enough to give it a quick read and call me, not to say that he can do it, not to say he can't do it, but to say that I was a stupid schmuck not to do it and take this opportunity to act with my daughter," Penn told reporters.
Dylan, Penn's child with ex-wife Robin Wright, said their relationship was nothing like the distant one in the film, despite her father's busy acting schedule.
"My parents were extremely present throughout my childhood. The fact that they took us out of Los Angeles where the industry is the focal point was an amazing decision in leading us to a normal upbringing," she said.
Her father said that, if anything, they had the opposite problem.
"While there were periods of time when I was away... once you get done with a job, you're the only parent who's there 24/7 -- that's when the kids get upset, when you're there all the time!" he said, laughing.
"Seems like they still like me OK, though."
"Flag Day" is among 24 films competing for the top Palme d'Or prize at the Cannes festival, which runs until Saturday.
‘Openly neglected by an obscene administration’: Sean Penn criticises Trump’s handling of pandemic
Premiering new film Flag Day in Cannes, director and actor likens former president’s approach to ‘someone with a machine gunning down communities that were most vulnerable’
00:35
Sean Penn criticises Donald Trump's handling of coronavirus pandemic – video
Sean Penn has criticised Donald Trump’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic, likening the former president’s approach to someone opening fire on vulnerable communities.
Speaking at a press conference following the premiere of his new film, Flag Day, Penn said:
“We were — not only as a country, but as a world – let down and openly neglected, misinformed. We had truth and reason assaulted under what was in all terms an obscene administration.
“When my team and I would come home from test and vaccinations sites at night, particularly during testing under Trump, to maddening news — it felt like someone with a machine gun gunning down communities that were most vulnerable from a turret at the White House.”
Sean Penn and his daughter, Dylan. Photograph: Lionel Hahn/Getty Images
Penn, who wore a mask when he was not speaking, said he was optimistic about the future under the new administration.
“In the transition to the task force that President Biden put together, it was really that feeling like a sun was rising. There was no effort of integrity coming from the federal government until the Trump administration was dismissed.”
Earlier this year Penn, who has always made his contempt for Trump evident, described him as “a man who all would concede is guilty of negligent homicide on a grand scale.”
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Penn is the founder of non-profit organisation Community Organized Relief Effort, which aims to focus fundraising and relief efforts wherever they are urgently required. CORE recently devoted considerable resource to hastening testing and vaccination efforts in New York and India.
Flag Day, in with Penn stars alongside real-life daughter, Dylan, and son, Hopper, as a con-man with a complicated relationship with his children, has been warmly received at the festival. The Guardian’s Peter Bradshaw hailed it as a return to form following the widely-ridiculed The Last Face, which premiered to boos and laughter five years ago.
“As an actor he’s still got the chops,” wrote Bradshaw, “a fierce masculine presence, a buzzard-like watchfulness always liable to break into a scornful grimace or lethal grin. His seductive address to the camera is almost unrivalled. Moreover, as a director, he knows how to bring the horsepower. And so it proves in this very watchable and well-made family drama.”
Dubai does it again: now world's deepest pool
Issued on: 11/07/2021 -
A diver experiences Deep Dive Dubai, the deepest swimming pool in the world GIUSEPPE CACACE, GIUSEPPE CACACE AFP
Dubai (AFP)
The city of superlatives with the world's tallest tower among its many records, Dubai now has the deepest swimming pool on the planet complete with a "sunken city" for divers to explore.
Deep Dive Dubai, which opened Wednesday but initially by invitation only, prides itself as "the only diving facility in the world" where you can go down 60 metres (almost 200 feet), 15 metres deeper than any other pool, as confirmed to AFP by Guinness World Records.
It contains 14.6 million litres (3.8 million gallons) of fresh water, a volume equivalent to six Olympic-size swimming pools.#photo1
Guided down by lights and ambient music, divers can play table football and other games at the bottom as well as explore an "abandoned sunken city" or just soak up the vegetation on the way.
The pool is equipped with more than 50 cameras, for entertainment and safety purposes.#photo2
A one-hour dive costs between $135 and $410, with Deep Dive vowing that it will open to the general public soon.
The oyster-shaped structure pays tribute to the pearl-diving tradition of the United Arab Emirates, of which Dubai is a member, explained Deep Dive Dubai's director Jarrod Jablonski, an expat from Florida in the United States.
Dubai, which from October hosts the delayed Expo 2020, reopened to tourists in July of last year and has organised one of the world's fastest vaccination campaigns against Covid-19.
As the global population exceeds 7.8 billion people, some French people have made the decision not to have children – a radical choice born out of a desire to help the planet and do their part to reverse global warming.
"Having a child would be totally against my principles. I’ve never wanted children and am more certain of this decision the older I get,” says Manon, 26. “I don’t see why I would impose another consumer on this world. In the Western world, we consume more than the resources available,” she adds.
Like Manon, more and more young adults are deciding not to have children for environmental reasons. Online they call themselves "childfree" or even "ginks" – short for "green inclinations, no kids" – and they staunchly defend their decision not to have children. World Population Day, which falls on July 11, serves as another reminder of the world’s ballooning population. It comes from the Day of Five Billion – July 11, 1987 – chosen by the United Nations as the approximate day on which the world population reached 5 billion.
"I have absolutely no desire to leave this planet to a child,” YouTuber Anna Bogen tells her more than 15,000 subscribers in a video on her channel. “When the planet has no resources left, I’ll be six feet under. But if I have a child, they and their children will have to live with it. I don’t want to inflict that on anybody.”
Denis Garnier, the president of Démographie Responsable (Responsible Demographics), an organisation founded in 2009 to promote a lower birth rate, says that over the past 10 years, talking about not having children has become a lot more common. “Young people are a lot more aware, thanks to the publication of studies about global warming and more public questioning about the destruction of biodiversity,” he explains.
A graphic on the organisation’s website counts in real time the number of people alive on earth. The counter steadily ticks upwards. “We’re already at 7.8 billion. It’s already too much. We should hit 8 billion by 2022 or 2023,” says Garnier.
'One less child, that’s 40 tonnes of carbon saved a year'
"Overpopulation has major environmental consequences. The calculation is simple: the more of us there are, the more CO2 we emit, and the worse climate change is,” says Jean-Loup Bertaux, a director of studies at the French National Centre for Scientific Research and the author of "Demographics, climate, migration: the state of emergency". “In France, one less child represents 40 tonnes of carbon saved per year. In comparison, choosing to use an electric car only represents two tonnes saved.”
Every year, the American NGO Global Footprint Network calculates Earth Overshoot Day, the day when the earth consumes more resources than it can regenerate that year. In 2020, that threshold was reached on August 22.
Those who have chosen to be childfree express anxiety about the future in online videos and comments, but also show a certain kind of defiance towards the previous generation. “I have never known an adult without children. For me, having kids was something mandatory, like getting up to go to school in the morning […] But we have to ask, what kind of world are we leaving to our kids? I don’t know if I want to leave them a world like this,” admits Clémence, a 27-year-old YouTuber.
'We’re lucky to be able to control pregnancy'
Manon finds the topic is difficult to raise with her parents, even if she was raised in a family where they were taught to “look after the planet”. “When we talk about it, they don’t really understand. For them, having a job, getting married, having kids is all part of the point of life. My position is beyond comprehension for them so we just avoid the subject.”
Her position is even harder for them to accept because she’s a woman, Manon says. “‘You’ll change your mind, you’re still young’, ‘You’ll see when you get a maternal instinct’… I don’t know if men receive the same comments as I do,” Manon says. “We’re lucky to be able to control pregnancy in France. That's not the case for women everywhere in the world. For some women, having a child or not isn’t a choice.”
Kabul urges Europe to halt forced deportations of Afghans
Issued on: 11/07/2021
There were almost 2.5 million registered refugees from Afghanistan in 2018 -- the second-largest refugee population in the world Ozan KOSE AFP/File
Kabul (AFP)
Afghanistan has urged European countries to halt forced deportations of Afghan migrants for the next three months, as security forces battle a wave of violence triggered by a dizzying Taliban offensive.
The United Nations said on Sunday the rising conflict is also causing "more suffering" across the violence-wracked country as it urged for continuous financial aid.
Afghanistan is facing a crisis as the insurgents snap up territory across the countryside, stretching government forces and leading to a fresh wave of internally displaced families, complicated by a renewed outbreak of Covid-19.
"The escalation of violence by the Taliban terrorist group in the country and the spread of the third wave of (Covid-19) have caused a great deal of economic and social unrest, creating concerns and challenges for the people," Afghanistan's refugees and repatriation ministry said in a statement on Saturday.
"The government's decision emphasises that host countries should refrain from forcibly deporting Afghan refugees... for the next three months," the ministry said, adding that the return of Afghans from Europe was worrying.
There were almost 2.5 million registered refugees from Afghanistan in 2018 -- the second-largest refugee population in the world, according to the United Nations refugee agency.
The vast majority are in neighbouring Pakistan, followed by Iran, and Europe.
While more than 570 Afghan refugees voluntarily returned to the country between January and March this year, aided by the UN, just six came from outside Pakistan and Iran, according to data from the UN's refugee agency.
- War causing more suffering -
Afghans make up a sizeable share of EU asylum seekers, with 44,190 first-time applications last year, out of a total of 416,600, according to Eurostat, the EU's statistics agency.
Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi last month said Europe should brace for a fresh inflow of migrants from Afghanistan after foreign forces leave the country.
This year, several EU countries agreed to offer asylum to Afghans who worked with foreign troops and are at risk of retaliatory attacks from the Taliban.
Afghanistan recorded more than 1,000 cases of Covid-19 on Sunday, the health ministry said.
Almost 135,000 cases and more than 5,700 deaths have been reported since the pandemic began, with the country reliant on donations from the international community to vaccinate its population.
Ramiz Alakbarov, the United Nations Deputy Special Representative for Afghanistan, said the country was also facing increased difficulties with the growing conflict since the Taliban launched their dizzying offensive.#photo1
"Pre-existing humanitarian needs are further exacerbated," he told reporters, adding that at least half of the country's 33.5 million people needed humanitarian assistance.
The "escalation of military activities and escalation of conflict and war is causing more suffering" apart from drought and Covid concerns, Alakbarov said.
He said that so far this year 25 humanitarian aid workers were killed while delivering relief items to the needy.
He called for continued financial support to meet Afghanistan's humanitarian assistance, adding that $450 million had come so far as global donations following an appeal of $1.3 billion made for 2021.
"The needs are so much greater, and continued assistance is needed," Alakbarov said.
Paul Verhoeven’s racy take on the lesbian-sex-in-a-convent genre has reignited talk of the “male gaze” in Cannes, even as female auteurs hail (some) progress in addressing gender bias both on and off the screen. Has the film world turned puritan?
According to Paul Verhoeven, the veteran provocateur that gave us “Basic Instinct” and “Showgirls”, the answer is yes. Five years after his rape-revenge thriller “Elle”, the Dutch director is back in Cannes with his latest competition entry “Benedetta”, a saucy nun romance set in counter-reformation Italy. He looked irritated at times during Saturday’s press conference as he fielded questions about blasphemy, nudity and raunchy sex scenes in his film.
“Don’t forget, in general, people, when they have sex, they take their clothes off,” Verhoeven snapped at one reporter. “So I’m stunned basically by the fact that we don’t want to look at the reality of life,” he added. “Why has this puritanism been introduced? It is, in my opinion, wrong.”
“Benedetta” is based on the true story of a mystic abbess who was credited with miraculously protecting her Tuscan hometown of Pescia from the plague – only to be stripped of her rank on account of her relationship with a fellow nun. Virginie Efira stars as the eponymous abbess, frequently baring it all as she charts Benedetta’s journey through spiritual and sexual ecstasy (which, in Verhoeven’s mind, clearly go hand in hand).
A nunsploitation comeback for the Covid-19 era (though Verhoeven actually filmed it before the onset of the modern-day “plague”), “Benedetta” is outrageous, erotic and often very funny, not least in its kinky use of liturgical objects as props. But the elaborate softcore quality of its sex scenes hardly fits with the notion that the protagonists are convent novices – and is bound to reignite talk of lesbian romance getting the “male gaze” treatment in Cannes.
The male gaze
The world’s leading film festival, which launched Verhoeven’s “Basic Instinct” almost 30 years ago, is no stranger to talk of the “male gaze”. In 2013, Palme d’Or-laureate Abdelatif Kechiche faced accusations of voyeurism for his lesbian drama “Blue is the Warmest Colour”. He faced more protests when he returned six years later, with part two of his “Mektoub My Love” series. The film took the most gruelling elements from his otherwise sublime part one – most notably the endless butt shots – and expanded them into an utterly plotless nightlong study of hedonistic release. Two years on, it still hasn’t been released in theatres.
In the middle of its thumping, throbbing, three-hour-long dancefloor sequence, Kechiche’s “Mektoub” featured a seemingly endless oral sex scene in which only the woman exhibited any flesh (though at least she was at the receiving end). This year, another sex scene has caused a buzz in Cannes, though critics have hailed it as profoundly feminist. It featured in Joachim Trier’s “The Worst Person in the World”, about a young woman trying to find herself as she shifts between lovers.
The Norwegian director has been credited in the past with directing lesbian sex scenes without playing to the “male gaze”. His latest work has dazzled both French and foreign critics, who praised its portrayal of shifting gender dynamics and proclaimed it an early favourite for the Palme d’Or. It has also shone a spotlight on the previously little known actress Renate Reinsve, an instant favourite for the Best Actress award.
“Growing up before #MeToo you kind of shape yourself with the strong opinions and presence of men,” Reinsve said in an interview with AFP. Speaking of her character in the film, she added: “She finds her identity in others’ eyes. When you free yourself from that, you become yourself and stronger.”
‘The first feminist director’
While very different, the movies by Trier, Verhoeven and Kechiche are at the heart of what French filmmaker and screenwriter Nathalie Marchak describes as an important and stimulating debate on the “male” and “female” gazes in film.
“There’s a million ways of filming a scene; the key question is where do I place my camera and what does it say,” she explained in an interview with FRANCE 24 in Cannes. “It’s a fascinating debate and one we shouldn’t shy away from. It’s part of cinema’s role to question the way we look at ourselves.”
It is not merely a matter of opposing male and female filmmakers, Marchak added, stressing that it is “perfectly possible for male directors to adopt a female gaze”. The point, she said, is to question the way we represent male and female characters.
Speaking of Pedro Almodovar earlier this week, US filmmaker and actress Jodie Foster described the Spanish director, who has made women central to so many of his films, as “the first feminist director for me".
“It was the first time I'd seen films that talked about women in an authentic way,” Foster said of Almodovar’s movies, a day after the legendary director presented her with an honorary Palme d’Or in Cannes. She called Almodovar an exception among male directors who “can't easily transpose themselves into a woman's body and ask themselves what the complicated and complex experience of a woman consists of".
Foster was just 13 when she first came to Cannes in 1976 for Martin Scorsese’s “Taxi Driver”, which won a controversial Palme d’Or that year. Later star turns included her Oscar-winning part in “Silence of the Lambs” (1991). She has also directed several films, including "Money Monster" with George Clooney and Julia Roberts.
Addressing the Cannes Film Festival in impeccable French on Wednesday, Foster said there had never been a better time for women to enter the film industry. Although male domination has "not changed completely", she said, "there is now an awareness that it's been too long that we haven't heard stories told by women."
“I know it's a bit cliche to say 'tell your own stories',” Foster said. “But what I mean is: Ask yourself questions about the truthfulness of things and whether they resonate within you instead of pleasing others, be it the public or producers.”
Levelling out the gender bias
The dearth of women holding senior positions in the industry, and of female filmmakers in particular, is a recurrent subject in Cannes, where only one woman – Jane Campion for “The Piano” (1993) – has ever won the Palme d’Or.
Speaking to FRANCE 24 ahead of the festival, Cannes’ artistic director Thierry Frémaux pointed to the relatively high number of female directors in the Un Certain Regard sidebar, dedicated to emerging talent. He cited it as evidence that, “the future of cinema will be female”.
But what about now? There are still only four women in the main competition, out of a record 24 participants. The lack of progress is all the more glaring when compared with the main parallel selections, the Critics’ Week and the Directors’ Fortnight, which have attained near-parity this year.
Cannes’ defenders point out that the huge gender imbalance in the main competition generally reflects the imbalance in the number of films submitted. But critics counter that the selection process is naturally skewed in favour of established directors who are fixtures in an industry still dominated by men. As the person who is ultimately in charge of selecting candidates for cinema’s most prestigious award, they add, Cannes’ artistic director has immense clout in the film world and a responsibility to foster change.
Spot the woman: Jane Campion, the only female director to win a Palme d'Or, pictured with other past laureates at the 70th Cannes Film Festival. Mehdi Chebil, FRANCE 24
While Frémaux has spoken in support of women-driven initiatives for more gender equality, he has steadfastly refused to push female directors in the festival’s main competition through affirmative action – which in France translates as “positive discrimination” but is viewed negatively. The Cannes director has repeatedly stressed that he chooses films based on merit and not on gender.
It’s a view shared by Marchak, herself a vocal campaigner for greater gender equality, but for whom talk of “positive discrimination” is “insulting” for women.
“Female directors want to be selected for major festivals not because they are women but because their films deserve the spotlight,” she explained. The point is not to favour female directors over their male counterparts, she added, but to ensure women are present in the selection process and that their lack of visibility throughout the industry is addressed.
“When it comes to selecting films for competitions, I don’t think women are any more lenient with female directors than men,” Marchak said. “But female directors might not enjoy the same visibility from the get-go, so it’s important to go find them.”
In the Austrian Alps, post-Holocaust escape is re-enacted
Issued on: 11/07/2021 -
Director, actor and author of the theatre group Teatro Caprile, Andreas Kosek, re-enacts the escape of Jews fleeing Austria after the Holocaust ALEX HALADA AFP
Krimml (Austria) (AFP)
Sidestepping a roaring waterfall and stumbling over rocks, an Austrian amateur theatre group re-enacts the treacherous Alpine escape of thousands of Jews seeking a new home after the Holocaust.
Surrounded by Austria's snow-capped peaks, two dozen spectators hike alongside lay actors who perform scenes based on the real experiences of as many as 8,000 Holocaust survivors who traversed the Alps to reach the Italian harbour of Genoa, where they hoped to board ships to Palestine in 1947.
"The special thing about the play is that you experience it and you get an idea of what people went through back then," says actor Celine Nerbl of the Pinzgau region group Teatro Caprile, which has been staging the theatre hike in summer.
After the end of World War II, thousands remained stuck in camps for displaced Holocaust survivors in countries such as Austria, with little hope of starting a new life while anti-Semitism remained so deeply entrenched.
The Jewish flight aid organisation Bricha smuggled groups of as many as 200 people on trucks via the camp "Givat Avoda", which translates to "Hill of Labour", in the Austrian town of Saalfelden, to Krimml from where they had to continue by foot.
It is here that the re-enactment begins, and it is an emotional, eight-hour-long hike for participants.#photo1
"You can feel yourself in there," says Austrian Marion Mikenda, a local who participated in the guided trek with her father. - The only route -
"Nobody wanted them, even after the war, so they had to flee," says historian Rudolf Leo, who grew up in Salzburg province and who remembers his mother telling him about the 1947 Jewish exodus.
Back then, British allied forces prevented Jews from fleeing to British-controlled Palestine, making the back country mountain pass of Krimml their only escape route.
"I always thought she was wrong about the year," Leo says of his mother's memories. "But, no, she was completely right."
Physical exertion helps the audience imagine what the refugees experienced, says author and director Andreas Kosek.
He set the scenes along the original path: in a dense spruce forest, a lush meadow where cows graze, and inside a hut which, at an elevation of over 1,600 metres (5,250 feet), had offered the Jewish refugees shelter and a meal.#photo2
"I was here with people who said 'We never imagined there were mountains this steep'," says Celine Nerbl's husband Hans, who accompanies the group as a hiking guide.
The main difference is that today's hikers are well-equipped and travel by day. In 1947, the Jewish refugees were at times forced to hike in complete darkness, some carrying their children and hoping not to be spotted. - Reviving history -
The history of the displaced persons' camp and the escape of Holocaust survivors had long been forgotten, but they are slowly being resurrected in Austria. In 2007, the Alpine Peace Crossing association was founded to commemorate the post-war exodus with an annual hike.
Austrian President Alexander Van der Bellen participated in the hike in 2017, and while it could only be held virtually due to the pandemic last year, hundreds of people once again followed in the Holocaust survivors' footsteps this summer.
Thinking of what happened back then, Hans says he sees a lot of parallels to refugees migrating today.
"The reasons for flight have stayed the same, and so has the attitude of countries who don't want to take anyone in," he says.
As for the hikes, actor Nerbl says descendants of survivors have even travelled by plane from Israel to Austria.#photo3
"They want to walk with us, and that's often very, very moving," she notes, adding that she remembers the son of two survivors who broke down and cried.
His parents, he told Nerbl, had made the journey with the few belongings they could carry -- and the hope for a new life.
