1
Listen, white world,
As our dead roar
Listen to my zombi voice
Honouring our dead
Ren Depestre
You there!
Move, dammit!
Hit them if they won't walk.
Work!
Work!
Work faster!
"France,"
wrote Michelet in 1846,
"is guilty of trying to free the world
50 years ago.
They have not pardoned you
and they never will.
You are their constant fear.
You may distinguish yourselves
with different party names,
but, as French citizens,
you are condemned en masse.
PARIS, TODAY
For Europe, France will only ever bear
a single name,
an inexpiable name,
which is also its true and eternal one:
The Revolution."
That's beautiful,
but is it true?
It's beautiful and, in a way,
we recognize ourselves
in Michelet's The People.
We recognize ourselves
for we know that even now,
when people around the world
speak of revolution,
they link it to the French Revolution.
Conversely, France is the name
of the revolution.
The two are linked.
But...
subsequently,
we have seen how France too,
at many moments and in many ways,
has not always lived up to this promise.
So, how do we deal with this history?
How do we pursue it?
Firstly, there's the issue of
the continuation
of the Revolution's completion.
As you've understood,
Napoleon ends the Revolution
in both meanings of the word.
He completes it
and finishes it off.
He pursues it and betrays it.
He betrays it, but he pursues it.
At the same time.
So, if we want to do history,
we must ask
how do we write it?
Do we write
a continuing history of progress
as a form of liberty unfolding,
but we know that's not true.
We have seen how that liberty
was continually frustrated,
that it was never really implemented,
and what obscures it?
What means, in a way,
it doesn't come to pass?
And that's terrible.
Liberalism.
Liberalism,
in the 19th-century meaning,
in other words, the ways
of adapting the idea of progress
to liberty.
In a way, liberalism
obscures liberty.
It ensures
that it never quite comes to pass.
So we cannot write a continuing history
of the 19th century.
We have no right
as that is not how it happened.
What I am suggesting is a history
that is discontinuous, sputtering.
Hesitant.
Or rather a subterranean history
of the 19th-century idea of liberty
that would be seeking its re-emergence,
occasionally resulting in experiences,
experiences of liberty.
That's why I picked that title.
In conclusion, let's think about that.
Don't take notes, just try to think.
How do we relate it?
It's hard to write the history
of the 19th century
because it invented History.
It's the century of History.
The notion of experience.
What does a new experience mean?
Trying something
that has never been done.
We'll try something.
It also means
trying something together
as a group experience.
Through it, we'll find ourselves
to be braver, more inventive,
more surprising than we thought.
Like Damso's sexist.
He's a storyteller.
He may not mean it.
It'd be like Stephen King
dressing as a clown.
Maybe he does.
You're the clown.
It's kind of borderline anyway.
Ok, they're stories
with fictional characters,
but some lines are a bit much.
The songs are awesome.
Yeah, wild.
What's your favourite.
Not the most famous.
I'm not dumb.
My love,
It's terrible how much I miss you.
But I love the feeling.
It reminds me how I love you.
And, I hope, how you love me.
I keep thinking about last summer.
It's so beautifully unreal,
I wonder if it happened.
I count the days to half-term.
I count the hours.
Time passes so slowly here.
We live in such isolation.
We just work and wait.
I try to take an interest
in classes, in the others...
I've met a new girl here called Mlissa.
She's Haitian.
She seemed as lonely as me.
So we talked.
She's odd, but we like
the same horror movies and books,
the same clothes and music.
She loves Urban Outfitters and Damso.
I'd like her in the sorority,
but we haven't decided yet.
The realists' response
is to favour description.
Description exceeds
the narrative structure
as in the incipit of Eugnie Grandet
that lingers over an architectural image
rather than enter the plot.
In the introduction to Le Pre Goriot,
Balzac writes,
"This is neither a novel,
nor fiction, all is true."
I keep busy, waiting for you.
I miss your kisses terribly.
Horribly.
Each lost kiss
will be returned a hundredfold.
I long to feel you.
Yours, Fanny
She's weird though.
Weird is cool.
She dances well.
What video is it?
I mean Mlissa.
- Where is she?
- There.
Who cares how she dances?
It's a literary sorority.
Is she cool enough to hang with us?
Where did she dance?
In class yesterday. She was alone.
What to?
No music.
Ok...
She dances without music?
She's too weird.
I think it's cool.
Do we take her or not?
Is she cool or weird?
I find her cool.
I think she's weird.
She talks quietly, she's always alone...
She's often with me.
You're weird too.
With the Catholic nerds here,
alone isn't so bad.
That makes her cool.
Her dad has the Legion of Honour?
I guess so. He must be a diplomat.
Do we take her?
We do the test and see.
Yeah, cool.
Get into place.
In defence.
What did you tell her?
That we'd do it soon.
She asked what'll happen
and I said she couldn't know.
What did she say?
Nothing.
I said she was weird.
My love,
Last night a girl called Lola
came on to me.
She's very beautiful,
very sexy, with a beautiful body.
She kept saying she wanted me.
She tried to kiss me.
I almost wanted to and nearly said yes,
but I didn't.
My love is faithful to you.
Yours, Fanny
midnight @fakestatues
Work!
I beat him,
I got him out
and I brought him here.
Put that down!
Come and sit down.
Whatever happens,
you never talk about this.
Ok, but can we be here?
No worries.
Not this late.
But a sorority is fine. They love it.
Obviously they would.
If you say you want a sorority
for contemporary literature,
they love it.
What do I do?
To join, you have to tell us
something personal.
Something capital.
Then we decide.
Like what?
Something important for you.
Not just your favourite music
or something.
- What did you say?
- Sister, don't tell her.
It can be your vision of life
or death. I dunno.
Pass it on.
The main thing is
it has to speak to us all.
We all have to agree.
You get only one chance. One shot.
Shit, blow them out!
Close.
Really close, shit.
It's ok, they won't be back.
It's a drag
they pressure us at night too.
Maths and Physics
is more depressing than pressure.
We're already
on second degree trinomials.
It's not on our programme.
Revise together tomorrow?
Where were we?
Waiting for Mlissa.
It's stressful.
- Take time to think.
- Not centuries.
It has to be something powerful
inside you.
It's stressful.
Drink and go for it.
- What is it?
- Gin.
It's strong.
Without you, I'm like a soulless body
in the night.
"Listen, white world
As our dead roar
Listen to my zombi voice
Honouring our dead
Listen, white world
To my typhoon of beasts
My blood rending my sorrow
On the world's paths
Listen, white world
Negro blood runs
The slave ships' hold pours into the sea
The foam of our suffering
The fields of cotton
Of coffee, of sugarcane
The Chicago abattoirs
The corn fields of Indigo
The sugar factories
Your ships' holds
The mining companies
Your empires' constructions
Factories, mines,
Hell for our muscles on this earth
The foam of black sweat
Descends to the sea tonight
Listen, white world
To my zombi roar
We have to deliberate.
Stay here?
- We go next door?
- Sure.
- Welcome, sister.
- Thank you.
How did you end up here?
I came when I was seven,
after the earthquake.
Our house had been destroyed.
So we came to France,
then to this school.
Your dad had the Legion of Honour?
No, my mother.
Yeah? How?
I don't know.
She fought the dictatorship
and injustice.
So she got the Legion of Honour.
Is your mother here or over there now?
My mother's dead. My father too.
They died in the earthquake.
I'm sorry.
Shit...
You said it.
- Want the music off?
- It's ok, it was long ago.
So, you're all alone?
No, I live with my aunt.
Is your aunt cool?
Really cool. We get on well.
Shit.
Thank God for that.
What does she do?
She's a mambo.
What's a mambo? A dancer?
A mambo...
is a mambo.
Hello, girls.
Hello, Madam Superintendent.
Thank you.
Last year 100% of our students
passed the baccalaureate.
98.5% with a commendation,
72% with distinction.
These figures reflect
the teachers and students' work
and the spirit of this school
based on national values
such as merit, hard work,
solidarity and emulation.
I'm very proud
and I hope you are too.
When Napoleon imagined this school
in 1804,
he wrote,
"Raise believers and not reasoners."
But he'd be impressed
to see how you reason.
If you are here,
a parent, a grandparent
or a great-grandparent
holds the Legion of Honour,
the Order of Merit
or the Military Medal.
You know that. Don't forget it.
They worked for our nation.
Thank them.
Thank them by perpetuating this merit
in your work.
Honour them.
Next Monday, with the French President,
you will attend
the relighting
of the unknown soldier's flame.
It's a great honour.
And a responsibility.
It must allow you to realize
the values you have inherited
and your mission
to pass them on in turn.
Thank you, girls.
Goodbye, Madam Superintendent.
Mambo, word of Bantu origin
meaning "choral voice".
Woman mambo
Mambo (voodoo)
Dambala
The spirit of the grass snake
Give him syrup
I'm both hungry and not hungry.
How can anyone make food this gross?
This bad, it takes talent.
- Who is it?
- Lucie.
Her guy split, maybe she put a photo.
Her gypsy?
A total drama.
She's feeling bad?
- Not really.
- She's fine.
Let me see.
In a sweatsuit, like she does hip-hop.
Like she's a dancer.
She's Rihanna.
Walmart Rihanna.
Stop stalking her, it's a drag.
What's wrong?
Gross.
Freaky.
Freaky, but cool.
What're you doing?
Stalking Lucie. And you?
I'm a bit sick of the uniform.
But it's ok.
I have new friends. They're nice.
No, I don't really remember.
They approached me.
I wouldn't have otherwise.
It's great. We form a sort of group.
We hang out. We listen to music.
But sometimes I'm a bit embarrassed
to listen to the music I like.
Yes, I like it.
No, I don't really know.
Shit...
15 minutes later than two hours ago.
What is this time warp?
The world's ending, we'll all die.
We look like corpses anyway.
Word. I won't die
before I go back to Citadium.
Their sweaters are hot.
- I really want to go too.
- Dream on.
Selfie.
Fanny, come on.
It's a drag.
You're a pain, you nerd.
My love, only a week and a half
till I see you.
Eleven days. I'm sick of it.
I can't wait to get out, see you
and live at last.
Until then, the hell of studying.
With the hell of your absence.
I'm nearly there, nearly in your arms.
In your mouth.
Fanny, yours forever
Young lady...
I see it's 7:45, not 8 pm.
The study period isn't over.
Here lies Clairvius Narcisse
1922 - 1962
You jerk!
What is that?
Shit, I totally screwed up
in French today.
I'll never get a medal now.
Chill, your worst grade is 18.
Really, I'm freaking out.
You always say that.
Will you get a medal, Mlissa?
I don't know.
I'll get nothing with my grades.
I could kill the inventor
of spatial geometry.
What about Aqueous Solution?
The Physics teacher, sure.
He's so sexy.
Think so?
You bet, total fantasy.
Totally!
Mlissa?
Not really, he's too skinny.
He's still the sexiest guy here.
Easy, there are only three.
He's falsely sexy.
A fake, like.
He stares at us, it's freaky.
Totally freaky.
I like it when he stares.
Seriously?
Sister, do my liner, please?
- Your poem was ace. What's it called?
- Captain Zombi.
I'm into zombies.
Zombies are gross.
No, they're cool.
Cool? They eat other people.
Bullshit.
In old movies, zombies walked slowly.
Now, they run like it's natural.
Everything moves faster now,
zombies too.
I don't give a shit
I don't give a shit
I show no respect
This ain't love
I just want your ass
Don't come weeping
No one can love me but me
If you're looking for snow
My tag never shows
Only my crew knows who I am
Gimme your cheek to wipe off
The O.G.
Trains in school or in jail
I hate the cops
Cos cops hate what we are
Sweatpants at your wedding
To show no respect
Cos since we met
You never called me once
Except the day I made it
No surprise I show no respect
Except the day I made it
No surprise I show no respect
Motherfucking bastard
No support, I recall
And you, bitch
Talking about your Louboutins
My lines say fuck you
I know my way around a fuck
Never plan to change
Your G-spot's dead
From the fucking you get
Remember I fucked him over
No surprise I show no respect
Ok, sister?
Great, and you?
What's up?
I'm gonna eat you.
She made weird sounds last night.
Yeah? Like what?
Weird sounds,
you can't tell if she's asleep or not.
Like what?
Well, like...
- Like that.
- Ok.
Really freaky and weird.
My Pablo,
I dreamt of you last night.
I dreamt of us.
It was sublime.
I can't even relate it.
I can't wait for it to be real.
What is a pure element?
It's a substance
with a range of physical
or chemical characteristics
making up its identity.
What characterizes a substance?
Try to answer.
Heard of fusion temperature?
Solubility?
No?
Right...
A pure element is a substance
that is distinct from a blend...
My love,
your last message broke me.
It shattered me.
Why?
Less than two weeks till we met.
I was full of joy.
Of love.
Of desire.
Now it's finished.
Your words finished me.
I feel like dying.
Dying right now.
Erzulie came down from the mountains
It's still going well for her.
Last week, she got 17 in French.
A good grade in History too.
I'd just like her
to have more memories of her home.
Even for me,
the memories are fading.
24 years, Myriam...
24 years since Dad died.
The ceremony is tomorrow.
I'm trying to arrange things from here.
It's settled with the houngan.
It'll be a fine ceremony.
All right...
When did the Roman Empire
reach its apogee?
In the time of Christ?
Yes, but more precisely?
I forget.
More or less 120 years after Christ.
Use your pen to draw the borders
of the empire at its apogee.
- I start here?
- No, here.
Then this way...
So what's Eddy doing?
He's sick again?
No!
He opened the restaurant?
Already eaten there?
Yes, great.
I can't come for the ceremony.
The flight's almost 2,000 euros
for the two of us.
It makes me sad.
But it doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter.
My spirit will be with you.
It's as if I was there.
How's Stanley?
They rebuilt your house,
but it fell down again.
I don't think the builder
had the best materials.
But they've started building once more.
Stanley's staying with Jasmine.
She takes good care of him.
He's in shape.
Patricia...
Eddy is in shape.
Your son is in great shape.
Mlissa, honey, how are you?
I want to hear you, love.
Did school go well?
What?
See the uniform as a form of equality,
not as a burden.
You wore one in Haiti too.
Yes, sweetheart, all students
wear a uniform back home.
Anyhow, are you managing to make
new friends at school?
That's good then.
But do you like that music?
So what?
You're allowed to like Damso.
Just stay as you are,
don't change for that.
You know what the words say,
but also who you are.
What's the problem?
Honey, you know who you are.
You're a beautiful young woman.
You're black.
You're a survivor.
And you're free to do what you want.
I'm in class with Mlissa.
May I come in?
Is something wrong?
No, but I wanted to see you.
May I come in?
Yes. Come in.
Does she have a problem?
No, she's fine.
But I have a problem.
Are you sick?
Not sick, but desperate.
What can I do?
I feel I'm possessed.
I want to get rid
of what makes me unhappy.
All my thoughts and memories.
- You do black magic, right?
- No.
I'm not a witch.
I'm a mambo.
I don't do exorcisms.
Did Mlissa give you my address?
No, I found it in her things.
She knows you're here?
No. I don't want her to.
I don't do that.
You have to go now.
I want to die.
Because of a boy? Ridiculous.
Lots of people die of disease,
disaster or accidents.
You do voodoo.
You can help me live.
Voodoo doesn't do that.
I told you, I feel possessed.
I can pay. I'll give you 1,000 euros.
It's not that.
You need to know the culture.
I learn fast.
You can't just learn.
You can't use it
just to get over an upset.
You feel desperate now,
but it will pass.
You don't need help or magic,
you just need time.
It's not "an upset".
Love may not be a reason for you,
but I want to die.
Don't I count
cos I'm white and healthy?
Can suffering be ranked?
Tell me.
You have to understand.
Voodoo is an inner strength.
It gives me strength to work.
It's the daily awakening of a people.
When you belong to voodoo,
you belong to a community.
I survived the earthquake.
I'm a survivor.
Now, I'm here to help.
All these people died
in the earthquake.
I still talk to them
and give them news.
- You give news to the dead?
- Yes, I give news to the dead.
Look, that's Myriam.
She's Mlissa's mother.
I talk about her daughter.
I tell her.
I give her news. She needs it.
- She really had the Legion of Honour?
- Yes.
How?
She had it...
because she had a mission to evaluate
crimes against humanity
under Duvalier.
She did great things for us.
So did Reynald.
Him there.
Sometimes, Reynald...
enters me.
When the strength enters,
my spirit, Katy's, leaves me.
I want Pablo in me.
You're wrong. You don't want that.
I do, I want him in me.
Pablo isn't a spirit.
We cannot unite your two souls.
A living spirit cannot enter a body.
You said you wanted to forget.
No, I really want him in me.
I don't want to forget. I can pay 1,500.
500 now, the rest later.
Don't take this lightly.
It can be a powerful thing.
Violent.
Especially if you're not used to it.
- Violent how?
- Violent.
But we're not afraid.
We know death.
We live with it constantly.
I've been next to death all my life.
I know.
My father was a zombi.
Know what a zombi is?
Do you know?
I dunno.
Then think hard
before getting any closer.
Does Mlissa have a room here?
Of course.
May I see it?
She does voodoo too?
No, she's far from all that.
What does she do here?
The same as every girl her age.
I've thought it over.
I want to try.
I'll bring the rest tomorrow.
- I can't tomorrow.
- I have no choice.
The school thinks
I'm at my parents' for a funeral.
I can't do it twice.
There's something weird.
- Where's Fanny?
- At a funeral.
Someone close?
Dunno.
If it was really close,
she'd have said.
An old aunt or something.
- She didn't tell me.
- Yeah?
Still, funerals are a real bummer.
Hello, everyone.
No class today.
But a surprise test.
The subject is
the consequences of the People's Spring.
Not the events.
Don't relate it, try to understand it.
Two hours, weighting factor three.
Get to work.
Are you ready?
I'm ready.
HAITI, TODAY
If I can come in, if I can get through
Let me in, if I can get through
Dambala
The spirit of the grass snake
Give him syrup
You scared me.
Girl, what's going on?
Nothing.
Why do you make weird sounds?
This morning, in the toilets.
I sometimes do it for fun.
For fun?
You're weird. What is this trip?
It's not a trip.
But...
there's a ceremony at home now
and, since I can't go,
this is how I participate.
What ceremony?
The anniversary
of my grandfather's death.
His death was a bit unusual.
Brought the photo?
Say "Pablo" several times.
My grandfather died of disease
in 1962.
He was buried immediately.
Over there,
we bury the dead immediately.
But, during his burial,
he was conscious.
He heard the soil falling on his coffin,
powerless.
That's horrible.
He was buried alive?
Half-alive, half-dead.
He became a zombi.
Shit, that's awful.
- What was his name?
- Clairvius.
Clairvius Narcisse.
He's going away
He's going away
Ogou, I'm wounded
Feray, I'm wounded
Wounded, I'm wounded
Yet I do not see my blood
That evening,
men came to open his grave.
They opened the coffin
and stole his body.
They gave him a sort of antidote
and took him to work
on a sugar plantation.
There were lots of other zombis there.
He could see, hear and work,
but he couldn't speak.
In fact, he felt nothing.
Without realizing,
he had lost his memory.
Zombis have no memory.
Each day,
they gave him zombi powder.
One day, by chance, he ate some meat.
A zombi that eats meat or salt
leaves his zombi state.
When a zombi recovers consciousness,
he can be very angry.
He tries to find his masters
to kill them.
Then he looks for his grave
to bury himself again.
My grandfather didn't.
He ran away to hide.
He didn't even go to his family.
- Why not?
- He was afraid.
He knew he'd been zombified
by a voodoo sorcerer, a houngan.
At his brother's request.
Why did his brother do that?
For an inheritance.
My grandfather was heir to land
he wanted to sell.
His brother didn't want to.
So what did he do?
Nothing.
He wandered.
He'd go to see his wife.
From a distance.
He never dared speak to her.
I'd have killed my brother.
Denounced him at least.
Impossible.
A voodoo secret society protects him.
The Bizango.
They zombify you.
That's hell.
Not hell, just how it is.
Then his brother died.
He went to my grandmother.
My aunt and mother were born just after.
Pablo...
Ogou
We want to call Clairvius through Ogou
Clairvius is not here
We are calling him
We are calling you!
Ogou!
Cemeteries are guarded by Lwas,
voodoo spirits that link God to humans.
There are loads. They exist.
They can come
to haunt you.
You become their Chwal,
their servant.
They possess you.
The worst one,
the most dangerous one
is Baron Samedi.
He's the head of the Guds,
the spirit of death.
He's a demon and a god.
I want a gift.
Brought me a gift?
I want a gift.
Brought me a gift?
Those who summon him
are approaching death.
Only he can accept someone
in the realm of the dead.
Fuck your mother.
What'll you do when I finish dancing?
Baron!
Is there any rum left?
Give me some rum, bitch!
Why shouldn't I have fun?
Baron...
Why couldn't I?
Change body, Baron.
Change body, Baron!
Got gifts for me?
What gifts do you have?
Don't look at me! Eyes closed!
Don't look at me!
Don't look at me!
Fuck, the music... Louder!
I feel it in my bwa.
In my dick, in my zozo.
Why content little bitches
who have little upsets?
She's a little bitch! A slut!
Fuck your mother.
Don't look at me.
The day of your father's ceremony.
I didn't want to.
So disrespectful!
I didn't want to!
Katy...
Your mouth stinks!
Don't look at me!
Fuck your mother.
I feel the music.
I feel it rising.
I feel the music in my bwa.
So you're a zombi's granddaughter?
Yes.
What's it like?
I don't know.
You really believe this?
- I don't know.
- It's all fake.
It isn't fake.
Every word is true.
My grandfather's true, my aunt too.
And all the spirits...
They're there.
Voodoo is beautiful.
It's powerful.
It shows that life and death
are inseparable.
My aunt says that
since my parents died.
It's over.
I'm not a slave.
And I never will be again.
After returning to the world,
Clairvius Narcisse
led a peaceful life again.
He died again in 1994,
at the age of 72
after enjoying his second life.
In the late 1990s,
1,000 new zombification cases
were thought to occur each year.
No one knows how many zombis
still roam
the Haitian countryside today.