Jonathan Ali talks to director Maxime Jean-Baptiste (born to Guianese and French parents) about his first feature, Kouté vwa (Hear a Voice)
In 2012, young musician and DJ Lucas Diomard became the tragic victim of a murder in French Guiana. This event continues to be a source of sadness for Lucas’ mother Nicole and Lucas’ best friend Yannick.
In the summer of 2023, Nicole’s young grandson Merrick arrives from his home in France to spend the summer with his grandmother. As time passes, Nicole, Yannick, and Merrick find themselves dealing with the loss of Lucas in different ways.
Directed by Lucas’ cousin Maxime Jean-Baptiste, the film combines documentary and fiction. koutevwa (hear the voice) is a heart-wrenching, often lyrical meditation on the after-effects of violence, particularly violence rooted in colonial contexts.
Maxime Jean-Baptiste, who was born in Paris to Guian and French parents and is based in Brussels, said: Jonathan Ali About his first completed novel.
How close were you with your cousin Lucas?
Lucas and I have been friends since childhood. we were the same age. He was a mirror to me. When he passed away in 2012, something inside me broke. I felt very angry. In 2018, I attended a film training session where I shared a rough edit of a video archive covering Lucas’ death. It included footage of a protest march in the streets and Lucas’s drum band playing at his funeral. After showing the edited version, I couldn’t speak and decided I should make a longer version.
When did you tell your Aunt Nicole about the idea for the movie?
When I first returned to Guiana, eight years after Lucas’ murder, I approached Nicole and began to understand her pain. It wasn’t easy at first. She was resistant to the idea of turning this story into a film. In 2022, the 10th anniversary of Lucas’ death, she decided to organize a memorial event, and I suggested that we make it into a film. Even though the experience was difficult, she gradually understood what we were doing. She understood the importance of telling this story.
This film is about real events and real people, and the script was written by you and your sister Audrey Jean-Baptiste.
yes. The 2022 film shoot was raw material to lay the groundwork during the writing process and create a more fictional story based in reality. We decided to write the film as if it were a coming-of-age film, emphasizing Merlich’s gaze. This allowed us to add life, spontaneity, and laughter to the tragedy of Lucas’ death that is at the heart of the film. As for Nicole, her story is complex and we wanted to tell it to the audience in her own words. Still, there was a precise setting for Nicole to create the way she told her story.
In the process, I realized that I was recreating a system that at some point could have destroyed myself and my relationships with Nicole, Merrick, and Yannick.
How did the traumatic nature of the subject matter shape the film?
There’s a lot of talk in the film industry, both fiction and documentary, about ethics and the impact movies have on not only actors and performers, but also the crew. The film has been shown at film festivals and the director has toured the world, but participants sometimes find themselves revisiting their traumas and becoming even more traumatized.
Actually, it took me a long time to see this. The first version of the script was extremely violent. In the process, I realized that I was recreating a system that at some point could have destroyed myself and my relationships with Nicole, Merrick, and Yannick. I had to stop and get very close to the participants and their relationships. We had to hear the voices of the protagonists ourselves. Nicole is now very proud of the film and plans to be there to talk about it when screenings are held in Guiana.
How was the movie premiere there?
The film was first shown in Guyana and touched many hearts. I felt it. The possibility of living even with such loss was open to them. And I think this is a new stage in the healing process for Nicole. Meanwhile, Yannick’s story is even more unresolved. He’s still traumatized, and this movie was like reopening that wound. But it can’t be cured. It will take quite some time. Movies can’t save the world. But wounds can be reopened for us to see them and hear their stories.
Kouté vwa (hear the voice) • 2024
Maxime Jean Baptiste
Belgium, France, French Guiana • 77 minutes
