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Notes from Underground

  And, indeed, I will ask on my own account here, an idle question: which is better—cheap happiness or exalted sufferings? Well, which is better?---Fyodor Dostoevsky ---Notes from Underground Fyodor Dostoevsky ---Notes from Underground Even now, so many years later, all this is somehow a very evil memory. I have many evil memories now, but ... hadn’t I better end my “Notes” here? I believe I made a mistake in beginning to write them, anyway I have felt ashamed all the time I’ve been writing this story; so it’s hardly literature so much as a corrective punishment.  Why, to tell long stories, showing how I have spoiled my life through morally rotting in my corner, through lack of fitting environment, through divorce from real life, and rankling spite in my underground world, would certainly not be interesting; a novel needs a hero, and all the traits for an anti-hero are expressly gathered together here, and what matters most, it all produces an unpleasant impression, for we are...
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Hope

To be human is to be a miracle of evolution conscious of its own miraculousness — a consciousness beautiful and bittersweet, for we have paid for it with a parallel awareness not only of our fundamental improbability but of our staggering fragility, of how physiologically precarious our survival is and how psychologically vulnerable our sanity. To make that awareness bearable, we have evolved a singular faculty that might just be the crowning miracle of our consciousness: hope.-- Erich Fromm


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La haine (Hate 1995)




Jusqu'ici tout va bien....
During a riot in the outskirts of Paris, police beat an Arab teenager (Abdel Ahmed Ghili) into a coma, fuelling a fire of hatred inside Vinz (Vincent Cassel) - a Jew who swears to "whack" a cop if the boy dies. It's left to Vinz's cohorts, the jocular Saïd (Saïd Taghmaoui) - also Arab - and subdued African boxer Hubert (Hubert Koundé) to talk him out of his bloody plan as they embark on a loafing odyssey from the immigrant neighborhoods to the big city. Still, the time bomb keeps ticking.
Counting down 24 hours, Kassovitz never gives the illusion of a happy ending. This is a fatalistic account of society's decline and it's plainly one-sided - the only cop who shows sympathy for the "troubled youth" is ineffective among an army of bigots and bullies. 
The film's ending is more or less predictable and inevitable, but effective all the same. The film is not about its ending. It is not about the landing, but about the fall. “Hate” is, I suppose, a Generation X film, whatever that means, but more mature and insightful than the American Gen X movies. In America, we cling to the notion that we have choice, and so if our Gen X heroes are alienated from society, it is their choice--it's their “lifestyle.” In France, Kassovitz says, it is society that has made the choice.












Directed by Mathieu Kassovitz, La Haine (translated as Hate) remains one of the most influential works in contemporary French cinema. Shot in stark black-and-white, the film is a 24-hour chronicle of three young men living in the banlieues (suburban housing projects) on the outskirts of Paris following a night of violent riots.







The story begins in the aftermath of a riot triggered by the police beating of a local youth, Abdel Ichaha, who remains in a coma. The film follows three friends—Vinz, Saïd, and Hubert—as they navigate the tension of their neighborhood and eventually travel into the center of Paris.






Visual Style and Impact

  • Cinematography: The decision to use black-and-white was both aesthetic and political, lending the film a documentary-like "realness" and removing the romanticized "City of Light" colors of Paris.

  • Dynamic Camerawork: The film is famous for its creative shots, such as the long tracking shots through the estates and the "dolly zoom" used during the trip to Paris to symbolize the characters' disorientation.

  • Sound Design: The film utilizes silence and ambient noise to build tension, most notably in the "DJ scene" where music from a window floats over the rooftops, providing a rare moment of transcendence.

















Legacy

La Haine was a critical and commercial sensation, winning the Best Director award at the Cannes Film Festival and three César Awards (including Best Film).

Decades later, the film remains tragically relevant. It is frequently cited during periods of civil unrest in France (such as the 2005 and 2023 riots) as it perfectly captured the festering social and economic grievances that continue to define the relationship between the French state and its suburban youth.









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