Why Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès has become a "popular icon"

Unes de Society on the Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès affair and promotional visual of the Un homme ordinary series.

-

• Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès is suspected of having killed his wife and four children, in Nantes, in 2011. He has not been found since.

• M6 broadcasts the first episodes of

  An Ordinary Man on

  Tuesday

  , a series freely inspired by this news item.

• After the

  Society

  survey

   published this summer and the various programs dedicated to "true crimes",

  An ordinary man

   confirms the power of fascination that Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès exerts with the French.

• "We undoubtedly give him too much importance, to the point that in the minds of some people, he has become a hero", laments to

  20 Minutes

   Béatrice Fonteneau, author of the book 

  Without pity for his people

  , devoted to the case.

Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès cannot be found, but he is everywhere.

In a two-part investigation by

magazine

which fascinated France this summer, in an issue of

followed by 363,000 viewers on September 5, in an episode of

that upset Netflix subscribers around the world or in

, the series launched this Tuesday evening on M6.

Is it too much?

"Much too much", answers

Béatrice Fonteneau.

Co-author of

, an account on the Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès affair published in 2016 (L'Archipel), she judges the interest in this man suspected of having killed his wife and four children in 2011, “Disproportionate and irrational”.

"All this frenzy is fun, obviously, but it's a bit excessive", declared himself in the columns of the

one of the four authors of the investigation of

sold hundreds of thousands of copies over reprints in July and August.

"There is a strong desire: that the killer be arrested and that morals be saved"

The omnipresence of this news item in the recent media landscape, in such a close fashion, is partly the result of chance.

The fortnightly had planned to publish its series of articles in April, to coincide with the anniversary date of the “Nantes massacre”.

The confinement forced him to review his plans.

The fiction of M6, freely inspired by the five-fold homicide - the names of the characters have been changed and the plot relocated to Lyon… - it almost was broadcast at the end of 2019. That is to say after the arrest of a man mistakenly taken for Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès.

The first episodes will finally be launched on Tuesday, which Guillaumes Charles, director of programs for the sixth channel, welcomes.

“What is rather good is that the series is very compatible with all the sectarian dimension that is developed in the magazine's investigation.

Limit we take the continuation of

.

"

An Ordinary Man

portrays Anna-Rose, a thirty-something, played by Emilie Dequenne, undertaking to elucidate the murders that took place two steps from her home.

Computer crack, she manages to rummage easily in the files of the police.

On the small screen, the stalking on the Internet, seems sewn with white thread.

However, it reflects a part of reality.

“People took themselves for investigators, unearthed emails from the father of the family and made it their business to find him by all means, underlines Béatrice Fonteneau.

There is a strong desire: that the killer be arrested and that morals be saved.

Is this thirst for justice enough to explain why the French are captivated by this news item more than any other?

Certainly not.

"A successful assassination"

“This affair has a Chabrolian side.

The family from the Catholic Nantes petty bourgeoisie is not as smooth as that: infidelities, money debts… the varnish cracks, continues Béatrice Fonteneau.

The public likes to be behind the scenes, to be surprised.

There is also the mystery: after nine years of investigation, the puzzle has still not been solved.

Finally, we must speak of the Machiavellianism of the supposed scenario: the purchase of lime, the training at the upstream shooting center… Reality goes beyond fiction.

It is also "a successful assassination": the alleged killer did not get caught and for many people, this is incredible.

"

“When I talk about it with friends around a table, everyone says to themselves that it is not possible, that he is still alive or that he is dead.

His story intrigues us ”, told

Arnaud Ducret, who plays the antihero inspired by Dupont de Ligonnès in

.

The title of the series is not lacking in cynicism.

Jean-Michel Laurence, the other author of

, explains: “The violence of the facts is totally out of step with the apparently peaceful and ordinary daily life of this family.

Everyone might imagine that this real nightmare could take place within their own family.

However, our investigation proves one thing: this family was absolutely nothing trivial!

"

"For some, he has become a hero"

This paradox - this man with the most banal physique would have been able to accomplish the unimaginable - reinforces the fascination exercised by the figure of Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès.

His silhouette is reinvented at will in fiction: before Arnaud Ducret in

, there was Kad Merad in

, broadcast on TF1 last year or Laurent Lafitte in

released in theaters in 2018. His face is reconstructed like a puzzle in kiosks.

His name is associated with more or less dubious jokes on social networks.

“If we think that pop culture is above all a mass culture, Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès does not embody a subversive figure but rather its opposite: a popular icon, says Jean-Michel Laurence.

In fact, what might be interesting to consider as an integral part of a subversive "pop culture" is the box of fantasies and the delusions that this family criminal affair - of absolute sadness - has generated as excesses. of all kinds.

"

Béatrice Fonteneau adds: “We undoubtedly attach too much importance to him, to the point that in the minds of some people, he has become a hero.

In the fictions, the stories, De Ligonnès is the central character.

He can be presented as a hero of modern times, a sort of lonely man who manages to escape the police chasing him.

To the point of forgetting the victims.

"

By the Web

The hunt for Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès continues on social networks

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