Cannes: remarks by Pio Marmaï taken out of context create controversy

Go "fart the mouth" of Emmanuel Macron.

This media release by actor Pio Marmaï, at a press conference at the Cannes Film Festival during the presentation of the film

Saturday, triggered an avalanche of reactions on social networks.

The words of the French actor must however be put into perspective.

At the moment when he pronounces them, Pio Marmaï seems indeed still immersed in the head of his last character. 

"I do not give lessons to anyone"

In this film by Catherine Corsini, the actor plays a truck driver "yellow vest" injured by a grenade fired by the police. He will cross, in the hospital, the road of Julie (Marina Foïs) and Rafaela (Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi). Together, they will follow the plight of nurses and doctors who lack the means. "With this film, I wanted to pay tribute to the caregivers who take care of all of us", explains the director.

At the beginning of the video sequence, Pio Marmaï answers the question of a journalist asking him what he would say to Emmanuel Macron.

The actor responds first: "I don't have much to say to many people, certainly not to Macron, I don't teach anyone."

Before continuing: "What I'm trying to tell by playing this guy is that there is this place of revolt, something of the order of the intimate. At a time of fragility and violence similar, there is an awkwardness that can arise, "says the actor.

Before adding: "but what is interesting is to think about how we tell this revolt, whether it happens through language, or through violence."

Yellow vests rarely in the cinema

It is at this moment that the actor tackles the head of state, always in the state of mind of his character.

"Macron, I would like to go to his place through the toilets and the pipes and bang his face, that obviously, a bit like everyone, in absolute terms ...", he said .

These words were condemned by several members of the majority such as the former Minister of the Interior Christophe Castaner.

"You win the prize for the most vulgar talk," tweeted the former interior minister.

The call to violence has no place anywhere, and your status as an “artist” makes it neither smarter nor more acceptable.

It is even the opposite: you win the prize for the most vulgar talk.

https://t.co/0BK2EWHXcL

- Christophe Castaner (@CCastaner) July 10, 2021

Until now, the cinema had little taken up the subject of "yellow vests", with the exception of

(2020), by Gustave Kervern and Benoit Delépine, and two documentaries:

(2019), by rebellious deputy François Ruffin, and

(2020), by David Dufresne.