“In Africa, homosexuals are disappearing from society”

• Change-color

  is a medium-length film by Stéphane Olijnyk available on Arte.tv.

• The director insisted on filming his homosexual love story in Africa but was faced with great difficulties.

• "I wanted to show how homosexual characters survive in a homophobic context," says Stéphane Olijnyk at

  20 Minutes

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The film opens with a scene between Ali and Saint, two young Ivorian lovers.

They obviously love each other.

But the marriage of Saint comes to put an end to this idyll.

Ali accuses him of being a color changer, of being one of those who disguise their identity to better blend in with the crowd.

With

, available on Arte.tv, Stéphane Olijnyk delivers the powerful story of an impossible love in a homophobic society.

Stuffed with ambivalence and heartbreaking fragility, the characters faithfully portray the reality of homosexuality in Côte d'Ivoire.

"Change-color", a faithful fiction

In Brazil, Stéphane Olijnyk had already directed

, another medium-length film.

“The idea was to make a second film that deals with homophobia on another continent.

I wanted to show how homosexual characters survive in a homophobic context.

The relationship between these two films is the desire to tell about homophobia within the homosexual community.

»

Stéphane Olijnyk offers a very journalistic approach to fiction.

“Before telling a story, I will first document myself.

I meet people, they tell me their story and from there, I develop stories.

I confronted this scenario with my Ivorian team and they intervened in the narration.

And in fact, it is very rooted in reality.

".

Homosexuals in Ivory Coast

Initially, Stéphane Olijnyk wanted to shoot this film in Senegal, where homosexuality is an offense punishable by one to five years in prison.

In 2019, he went to do some scouting in Dakar.

He quickly realized that the project was going to fall through and that no one there would have wanted to participate.

He was then put in contact with people in Côte d'Ivoire, where there is no homosexuality offence.

“Recently in Côte d'Ivoire, the government removed sexual orientation from discrimination.

This means that we can continue to hit on homosexuals and they won't be able to lodge a complaint.

".

A systemic homophobia that does not speak its name, which the director himself was confronted with: “I did not want to return to this country because I had been the victim of homophobia, with constant harassment.

I ended up having nightmares about it.

I also care about this film because it resonates with my own story.

".

The narrative of multiple violence

In

, each scene is one more level of violence.

The family, the others and even the gay community: everything locks Ali into a straitjacket of stifling morals.

Stéphane Olijnyk insists: “The weight of religion and family are very powerful.

It is always the relationship to the group that guides behavior.

The director speaks, without anger but with great precision, of these men he has met.

“On the one hand, these men want to live out their homosexual love.

And on the other hand, it's a disease.

We always put it in their heads that it was imported from the West and that it didn't exist in Africa.

»

Stéphane Olijnyk talks about the difficulty of being homosexual, anywhere.

But in Africa, he says, there is a form of vigilance that is taking hold.

“They can be denounced by other homosexuals at any time.

Many of them flee.

I know Africans who live in France or Germany because they were in danger at home.

»

A desire to make homosexuals exist

“The idea is not to give a moral lesson to Africans and tell them that they are late, not liberal enough, progressive or tolerant.

It's a completely different culture with, at the center, the group, the community, the family, which are very powerful entities.

And in Africa, outside the community, there is no social existence.

Homosexuals then become proscribed and banished.

They no longer have any means of subsistence.

They disappear from society.

Their only solution is to leave.

".

The observation of the situation of homosexuals in Côte d'Ivoire as in other countries is harsh.

Ali, at the heart of the medium-length film 

 , becomes witness to a vice that grips the freedoms of these men.

For thirty-five minutes, we do not take our eyes off him while he sees his whole world crumble.

Stéphane Olijnyk will continue to testify through fiction.

His next film on homophobia will be set in a Middle Eastern country.

He already knows that coming to the end of the shooting will be dangerous.

But he adds, sure of himself, “I'm going to make this film precisely because it's the impossibility that interests me”.

Television

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World

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• Ivory Coast

• Homosexuality

• Homophobia

• Africa

• art

• Movie theater

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