“Our Syrians are too nice? They wanted mean Arabs who cause trouble in a village full of kind-hearted French people, right?” Agitation reigns in the quiet, small Brittany village of Paimpont (1,672 inhabitants) under the gaze of the ducks on the abbey’s pond in Meet the Barbarians [+lee también:
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“That’s not what we voted for - Ukrainians are in high demand on the refugee market”. Plumber Hervé (Laurent Lafitte), called a fascist by some, isn’t at all satisfied with the explanations given by the mayor (Jean-Charles Clichet) regarding the news of the surprise nationality change of the refugees that the municipality has decided to welcome. On the other hand, for passionate teacher Joëlle (the director herself) and her childhood friend Anne (Sandrine Kiberlain), the wife of the slightly alcoholic owner of the local minimarket (Mathieu Demy), it is a real humanitarian mission to integrate as well as possible the Fayad Syrian family, made up of the architect Marwan (Ziad Bakri), his graphic designer wife Luna (Dalia Naous), her doctor and now one-legged sister Alma (Rita Hayek), their father Hassan (Fares Helou) and the two children, Dina and Waël.

Regional TV is even present to immortalise in a documentary this event that will deeply animate the population, from the youngest to the eldest, from nurse Géraldine (India Hair) to gamekeeper Johnny (Marc Fraize), through to the creperie owner (Brigitte Rouän), the organic farmer (Albert Delpy), the butcher couple and all the inhabitants. Everyone has a word to say about the newcomers and rumours abound (“terrorists?”, “polygamists?”, “they cut off your hands if you look at their daughters”, “the veil?”, “they look a bit like Romani people”, etc.), and graffiti immediately appears on the door of their foster home: “Barbarians out”.

“What does racism mean?” Julie Delpy brings answers to this topical question with a lot of humour, laying out all the facets of a very serious matter (not to say grave) under the cover of a village vaudeville. Constructed in five acts (“Welcome to Paimpont”, “1 Euro and Dictatorship”, “Our home”, “Broken” and “Alma and Alma”), the film skillfully navigates between its many characters (all very well interpreted) and perfectly controls its satirical dimension at the limit of realism, which allows it to say a lot about the tragedies of human stupidity without too much acidity. Often funny, Meet the Barbarians remains nevertheless, despite its proactive and politically engaged optimism, a worrying messenger of the small-mindedness of some people who mistake questions of principle with personal frustrations. But like the character played by the filmmaker, we can only hope, and so much the better if it is in a relatively good mood, that living together can be successful and “that the world can be better”.

Meet the Barbarians was produced by The Film and co-produced by Le Pacte. Charades handles international sales.