Je ne regrette rien...

ALEKSEI IS A YOUNG BELARUSIAN SEEKING A NEW LIFE IN FRANCE. ON THE RUN FROM A PAST THAT HE BURIES WHEN HE LOSES HIS FRIEND MIKHAIL, ALEKSEI THROWS HIMSELF INTO A DANGEROUS WORLD WHEN HE BECOMES A MEMBER OF THE FRENCH FOREIGN LEGION, WITH THE PROMISE OF FRENCH NATIONALITY. JULIAN NEWBY MET WITH THE FILM’S DIRECTOR GIACOMO ABBRUZZESE IN BERLIN, AHEAD OF ITS SCREENING IN COMPETITION AT THE 2023 BERLINALE

FOLLOWING a harrowing journey across Europe, Aleksei (Franz Rogowski) reaches Paris to enlist in the French Foreign Legion — a highly selective military outfit that allows any foreigner, even undocumented, to be granted a French passport.

Meanwhile in the Niger Delta, Jomo (Morr Ndiaye) is fighting against oil companies that threaten the survival of his village. His sister Udoka (Laetitia Ky) dreams of escaping, knowing that all is already lost here. Aleksei, Jomo and Udoka are destined to come together — in real life and in fantasy as they each struggle with what their lives might become. With Aleksei a soldier and Jomo an ecowarrior, their paths cross in combat in the jungle. Jomo dies and Aleksei is filled with guilt and starts to dig a grave with his bare hands.

He is haunted by what happened after he returns to the barracks. During a rowdy night with his comrades in a Paris disco, he separates himself and looks for the girl who had performed a mysterious African dance in the night club. He imagines her to be Jomo’s sister Udoka and at this point the film blurs real life with fantasy. During a brutal training session with the Legion, Alexsei refuses to join in the singing of Edith Piaf’s song Je ne regrette rien. The commander reprimands him and tries to convince him of the virtues of war. He would get a French passport in five years’ time, he could fall in love with a French woman, have children and send them to a good school. But Aleksei turns his back on him, places his residence permit in his locker and sets fire to it, along with his uniform.

The use of locations planned from the outset for Disco Boy, was ambitious for a debut feature. The action begins in Belarus as Aleksei and his friend Mikhail board a bus to Poland to watch a football match. On limited visas for the event, they make a break for it in Poland and begin a dangerous escape, headed for France and the French Foreign Legion.

Jomo and Udoka’s story meanwhile begins in the Niger Delta and the story eventually ends up in Paris.

“Shooting in the Niger Delta would have been very expensive so we had to renounce that very quickly,” director Giacomo Abbruzzese says. “We decided to use the French island Réunion, which is close to Madagascar. It was easier for insurance, for crew and also we got some funding from the island, as it’s a region of France.” He adds: “This island is superb as a tourist destination so we really had to find the most wild corner, where I don’t think anybody had shot before. For the border between Belarus and Poland we actually shot on the border between Ukraine and Poland — and Paris was Paris.”

By the end of 2019, Abbruzzese felt that the project had reached an impasse, considered too ambitious for a first fea- ture film and he expressed his desire to change producers. “We decided to accompany him on his first feature film, convinced of our artistic affinity and of the free, yet structured, framework that we could guarantee him,” according to producers Lionel Massol and Pauline Seigland. “We then decided to rethink the co-production structure, relying on the partners already in place, including Charades (France), Dugong Films (Italy) and Donten & Lacroix in Poland. We brought Belgium (Panache Productions, already Giacomo’s partner on another project) into the equation and repatriated sets to France to maintain greater artistic control and increase financing possibilities.”

The promise of a distinctly original film convinced KMBO, Canal+ and Ciné+ — the national funds of each country — and then Eurimages, to get on board. The shooting, postponed for the first time because of the pandemic, finally started in the fall of 2021.

Abbruzzese describes the narrative of the film as “fluid, punctuated by sudden, violent ruptures. Disco Boy unfolds in a porous present under constant pressure from the past, which manifests itself sometimes psychologically, sometimes in the form of hallucinations, dreams or supernatural events that escape categorisation,” he says. “I like to start from a documented reality, drawing from the real and then re-writing it. For me there is a mental dimension in film staging, flowing from a character’s perception. From the outset, I have integrated the river as a motif. In mythology, the river is where the living cross over into the land of the dead; here it is where realistic situations become fantasy-like and sensorial. There is the Oder, then the Seine and the Niger. The presence of the river water progressively unhinges perception and brings the film into a more dreamlike dimension.”

He says the film begins with “a naturalistic aesthetic which progressively slides into a psychedelic and shamanic register. And then little by little we go in a spiral into the heart of darkness of the movie, which is African dance — and all the elements that move around the dance — that is the structure of the film. And then you have the chapters — the first when they leave Belarus, and Aleksei reaches Paris and joins the Foreign Legion; then the story-in-a-story of the eco-terrorist. When Aleksei and Jomo cross paths in the jungle the movie becomes more psychedelic, even shamanic — internal and silent. I like it when a movie is a whole trip.”

The film was shot in Île de France, Réunion and Poland. Image post-production took place between Belgium, Italy and France; and sound post-production was done in Italy and France. The technical team and the cast are of 14 different nationalities, from the Ivory Coast to Croatia through Germany and Nigeria. Casting on five territories by eight people was carried out over two years.

Other artistic collaborators who joined the adventure include world-renowned electronic music artist Vitalic — Disco Boy is his second film soundtrack. For the dance scenes in the Niger Delta and in France, Abbruzzese worked with Nigerian choreographer Qudus Onikeku.

The film was well received when screened in Official Selection at the 2023 Berlin Film Festival. But with COVID, the struggle to get the financing and the moving from one tough location to the next, Abbruzzese is clear he wants to do things differently next time.

“This film was so hard. I hope after Disco Boy I will not have to work in such an intense way. But in the end the film is there and the core of the film is exactly what I wanted; it looks like what I wanted — the compromises were a bet, and the bet was won.”

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