It feels like it was yesterday when the film “L’Avocat de la terreur” about Jacques Vergès was screened, and a very animated debate took place in this cinema in Nice between the highly controversial figure of this documentary, France 3 journalist Marie-Pierre Courtellemont, and lawyer Denis Del Rio.
This time, it is not the subject that is already sparking comments but rather the theme of this first film; “The Protocols of the Rumeur,” directed by Marc Levin, which has won no less than three awards at festivals in Deauville, Berlin, and Sundance. The topic is the resurgence of the anti-Semitic conspiracy theory during the tragic events of September 11. In the aftermath of the tragedy, a rumor spread accusing Jews of orchestrating the attacks in New York and Washington, based on the claim that there were no Jewish victims.
Such mystification is reminiscent of the infamous “Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” attributing to Jews for over a century the intention of world domination. The Protocols are a forgery, fabricated in the early 1900s by Mathieu Golovinski, an anti-Semitic Russian forger, at the behest of the Tsar’s secret police, who used it as a propaganda tool. In fact, the forger had used a French pamphlet from 1864 against Napoleon III and replaced “Napoleon” with “the Jews” and “France” with “the world.”
The myth of the “worldwide Jewish conspiracy” is regularly reignited. Alarmed by this resurgence of anti-Semitism in his country, Marc Levin sets out to meet all those who continue to believe that Jews orchestrated 9/11—and who still help make “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion” a bestseller. His journey into the heart of hatred and intolerance begins… With new technologies, the rumor, this phenomenon of widespread transmission of a story with an appearance of truth and revelation, by any formal or informal means of communication, becomes even more impactful.
We are fully immersed in the theme of this “Month of Documentary.” With the participation in the debate of this first screening “The Protocols of the Rumeur,” of two personalities, Frédéric Encel, a doctor in geopolitics, and Maître Denis Del Rio, a lawyer specializing in media.
To complement the reflection, other screenings are proposed: “La vérité est ailleurs” by Barbara Necek; a report on these infamous “Protocols of the Elders of Zion” aired on Arte (Faculty of Letters, Nice, November 25 at 12:30 PM) and “Opération Lune” by William Karel in La Garde (Var). Do not miss this new edition, which will once again prove that the documentary genre is an irreplaceable medium.
