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CRIME

French cinema boss on trial for sexual assault

The head of France's top cinema institution Dominique Boutonnat denied sexually assaulting his godson as he went on trial Friday in a case that has led to calls for him to step down.

Published: 15 June 2024 12:59 CEST
The unnamed godson of the Centre National du Cinema or National Centre of Cinema director Dominique Boutonnat arrives at Nanterre courthouse, north suburb of Paris, on June 14, 2024, as Boutonnat appears on trial for the sexual assault of his 21-year-old godson
The unnamed godson of the Centre National du Cinema or National Centre of Cinema director Dominique Boutonnat arrives at Nanterre courthouse, north suburb of Paris, on June 14, 2024, as Boutonnat appears on trial for the sexual assault of his 21-year-old godson. (Photo by STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN / AFP)

The trial comes as French cinema reels from a renewed #MeToo reckoning that has seen several big names, including acting legend Gerard Depardieu, accused of sexual abuse.

READ ALSO: French actor Gérard Depardieu to be tried for sexual assault in October

Activists have denounced Boutonnat’s continued leadership of the National Centre of Cinema (CNC), whose role includes overseeing measures to curb sexual violence in the industry.

His godson accuses him of trying to masturbate him during a holiday in Greece in 2020 when he was 19.

“I looked at him to find my godfather and that’s when I saw someone completely different… It was someone using me to masturbate,” the godson, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the court.

Boutonnat responded in court that it was his godson who had initiated the situation and kissed him.

“I feel bad about leaving an ambiguous situation, but to say there was a sexual assault is false,” he told the court.

He was placed under investigation in February 2021 but still reappointed by the government as head of the CNC in July 2022.

Training to prevent abuse has in recent months become obligatory for films seeking public funding via the CNC.

The CNC told AFP that the case against Boutonnat came from “the private sphere” and had no relation to its activities.

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CULTURE

Last collective-run Paris cinema saved

The last Paris cinema run by a collective has been saved from closure with the help of Martin Scorsese and Quentin Tarantino, as supporters announced on Wednesday they had raised the funds to buy it.

Published: 20 June 2024 08:11 CEST
Last collective-run Paris cinema saved

After several years of work, the collective announced they had bought La Clef in the city’s Latin Quarter for €2.7 million.

Established in the 1970s, La Clef is one of the last independent cultural places remaining in the area, which is packed with students from the Sorbonne University but has seen its intellectual haunts largely driven out by high real-estate prices.

Another former film-going mecca in the city, the Champs-Elysees, has seen several landmark cinemas close as the street becomes dominated by fashion stores and tourist traps, with the famed UGC Normandie closing its doors last week.

La Clef forged a niche by highlighting African, Asian and South American filmmakers rarely programmed elsewhere.

The collective vowed it would stay true to that mission: “a place for showing rare films.”

“Those who wish can join the collective, learn how to organise a screening and propose a film,” they said.

READ MORE: Paris cinema named as world’s most-visited

In the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic, the cinema projected a film on to the side of a building for locked-down residents in nearby apartments.

La Clef was under threat for some six years after its owners, a bank subsidiary, decided to sell the premises.

But multiple occupations, political standoffs and petitions eventually paid off.

Scorsese lent his support to the movement last year, with a video and a column in French newspaper Liberation titled “La Clef must remain a cinema”.

The movement was able to raise two million euros in donations (with the rest borrowed from a bank), including through an art sale at the Palais de Tokyo to which the US director David Lynch contributed.

Tarantino and several French filmmakers, including Mathieu Amalric, Leos Carax and Celine Sciamma, were among the key donors.

After a short four-day re-opening next week, the collective must then raise another €600,000 over the coming year to bring the venue, with its dilapidated walls and tired seats, up to mandatory standards.

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