{"id":377883,"date":"2025-12-29T09:29:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-29T09:29:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/377883\/"},"modified":"2025-12-29T09:29:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-29T09:29:07","slug":"a-french-youth-review-bullfighters-grapple-with-the-horns-of-valour-and-acceptance-movies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/377883\/","title":{"rendered":"A French Youth review \u2013 bullfighters grapple with the horns of valour and acceptance | Movies"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">In southern France, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/culture\/2024\/oct\/03\/taurine-torpor-bullfightings-non-fatal-french-cousin-fights-for-survival\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">ancient and controversial tradition of Camargue bullfighting<\/a> remains to this day. In contrast to more lethal forms of the sport, participants \u2013 or raseteurs \u2013 win points by snatching various ribbons attached to the bulls, each of which comes with a cash prize up to thousands of euros. Following a group of athletes of north African descent, J\u00e9r\u00e9mie Battaglia\u2019s documentary paints a captivating portrait of multicultural France.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">For Jawad Bakloul and Belkacem Benhammou, the two young men at the centre of the film, the hardships multiply. Because of their ethnic background, the pair encounter a world of contradictions when they step into an arena. Not only do they face mortal danger, they also face racial abuse from the older, largely white spectators, despite upholding a piece of traditional French culture.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">Battaglia\u2019s film elegantly juxtaposes nerve-wrecking sequences of Camargue races with Bakloul and Benhammou\u2019s daily lives. After each match, their uniforms of pristine white polo and trousers are stained with dust and blood. One particularly harrowing moment shows Benhammou struck by a bull, resulting in a brutal muscle tear. Even more disturbing is an earlier scene, in which a group of spectators callously complain of boredom when a bull is too docile.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">Passionate as the raseteurs are about their task, they appear to be chasing after a mirage of valour for the entertainment of others. At the same time, systemic racism also prevents the men from gaining acceptance elsewhere \u2013 though highly educated, some are unable to find stable jobs. Battaglia\u2019s poignant film is more than a tribute to the talents of these extraordinary men: it also lays bare how integration is rarely a two-way process, with the burden of assimilation largely placed on the shoulders of the marginalised.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\"> A French Youth is on True Story from 2 January.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In southern France, the ancient and controversial tradition of Camargue bullfighting remains to this day. In contrast to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":377884,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[64,63,134,344],"class_list":{"0":"post-377883","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-movies"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=377883"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377883\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/377884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=377883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=377883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=377883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}