FROM FARCE TO DRAMA, CHASED BY THE POLICE

BENOIT POELVOORDE — DANY BOON — RIEN À DÉCLARER — 2010

FOOLISH FARCE

CAUSTIC SATIRE

NATIONAL FRENZY

It is a farce, more than a comedy, a big circus-like pamphlet against something we cannot really identify, and for motivations we do not want to really identify. It is funny because it is grotesque, but the subject is total absurdity: to show how ridiculous and even absurd the decision to get rid of national borders and customs services in Europe is.

This evolution happened in 1993 and was at the time seen as a relief, a liberation, a deliverance from an absurd bureaucratic system that did not solve any real problem, did not control any kind of traffic, but made everyone suspicious, nationalist, and angry.

But the film came out in 2010 at a time in France when Le Pen’s nationalistic and even jingoistic National Front was advancing towards a real power in the French political system. They demanded at the time that borders and customs be reinstated at least in France if not for all European countries. That went along with a strong demand to stop and block any kind of immigration, particularly from Muslim countries, hence being segregational against a particular religion.