Moune Ô

A film by

Belgium, French Guiana, France | 16' | 02/2022 | experimental documentary

"I close my eyes. The crowd makes me smile, breaks my body, and that's the end"

By presenting the festive events which escorted the projection of the film "Jean Galmot aventurier" by Alain Maline, where the filmmaker’s father played a role, the images of Moune Ô reveal the survival of the colonial inheritance within a Western collective unconscious always marked of stereotypes. From little gestures of daily life, the resistance toward oppression comes in its own rhythm.

“Through a formal and political rewind, Jean-Baptiste's technologized modifications of the premiere footage create a retroactive challenge to colonial memory.”
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“Through a formal and political rewind, Jean-Baptiste's technologized modifications of the premiere footage create a retroactive challenge to colonial memory.”
Square Eyes - 72_IFB_Forum_Expanded_bw_RGB
Square Eyes - TF_Laurels_Black

Maxime Jean-Baptiste

Biography

Maxime Jean-Baptiste is a filmmaker based between Brussels and Paris. He was born and raised in the context of the Guyanese and Antillean diaspora in France, to a French mother and a Guyanese father. His interest as an artist is to dig inside the complexity of Western colonial history by detecting the survival of traumas from the past in the present. His audiovisual and performance work is focused on archives and forms of reenactment as a perspective to conceive a vivid and embodied memory. His first film NOU VOIX (2018) was selected in about thirty festivals and art exhibitions and was awarded the Jury Prize at Festival des Cinémas Différents et Expérimentaux de Paris (FR). His second movie, LISTEN TO THE BEAT OF OUR IMAGES (2021), co-directed with his sister Audrey Jean-Baptiste was selected at CPH:DOX (Special Mention), Hotdocs, ISFF Clermont-Ferrand, Sundance Film Festival, IDFA among many others. His next film, MOUNE Ô (2022) will have its world premiere at the Berlinale (Forum Expanded), in february 2022.

Filmography

  • Nou Voix – short documentary – 2018
  • Listen To The Beat Of Our Images – short documentary – 2021
  • Moune Ô – short documentary – 2022
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Crew

Director: Maxime Jean-Baptiste
Screenplay: Maxime Jean-Baptiste
Producer: La Loge: Antoinette Jattiot, Wim Waelput
Sound mix: Patrick Hubard
Editor: Maxime Jean-Baptiste
Voice: Gilbert Jean-Baptiste
Original footage: Video footage from the documentary « L’affaire Galmot » directed by Alain Maline
Music used: Moune Ô, Josy Mass – album : Fanm (1984) / Mouvement d’avion, Edgar Nibul (1922) / The Only Thing Left, kwajbasket – album : The Fire Chats (2014)

Festivals

40+ selections, 2 awards

Select highlights: 

  • Berlinale, Germany (10 – 20 February, 2022)
    Forum Expanded
  • Go Short – International Short Film Festival, Netherlands (1 – 10 April, 2022)
    International Competition
  • Short Film Festival Hamburg, Germany (31 May – 6 June, 2022)
    International Competition
  • Olhar de Cinema – Festival Internacional de Cinema de Curitiba, Brazil (1 – 9 June, 2022)
    Olhares Brasil 
  • Costa Rica International Film Festival, Costa Rica (9 – 19 June, 2022)
    Enfoque
  • Third Horizon Film Festival, United States (23 – 26 June, 2022)
    Official Selection
  • Festival ECRÃ, Brazil (1 – 10 July, 2022)
    Official Selection
  • Dokufest – International Documentary and Short Film Festival, Kosovo (5 – 13 August, 2022)
    Short Dox Competition
  • Silhouette Short Film Festival, France (26 August – 3 September, 2022)
    Documentary Competition Won: Best Short Documentary
  • Open City Documentary Festival, United Kingdom (7 – 13 September, 2022) 
    What Rules The Invisible

Password




Press materials

EPK: Click here

Stills, poster & director’s photo: Click here

Dialogue list: Click here

Downloadable trailer: Click here

Excerpts: Click here

Press quotes

“As if history were taking a moment to reflect on itself, Moune Ô not only reveals the inner process of memory by remembering this episode in the filmmaker’s and his father’s life, but it also transcends memory itself.”
Festival review: Marius Hrdy – Repeating Islands

“It asks us how we remember the past and who is affected by our representations of the past.”
Review: Melanie Münninghoff – Go Short

“MOUNE Ô is a beautiful poetic tapestry of sound, image, and emotion that looks at the history of colonization through the cinematic medium. The film brings “the extra”, the othered, the periphery to the center of focus while offering space for deep contemplation and reflection. The honesty this film carries is truly a unique one.”
Jury statement Pegah Pasalar – Onion City Experimental Film Festival