Sud
Chantal Akerman
1999 - 70 min - Betacam SP - Couleur - France

"This eclectic and edgy film, shot in the South of the United States, is in some way both an echo and a counterpoint to another film I made in the early nineties in Eastern Europe. It is a journey too, but this time in hot and humid weather conditions that sometimes go to one's head.
At the heart of this journey is the murder of James Byrd Jr, and his presence haunts the entire film. This is not an anatomy of his murder, nor the autopsy of a black man lynched by three young white males, but more an evocation of how this event fits in to a landscape and climate as much mental as physical.
How does the southern silence become so heavy and so menacing so suddlenly ? How do the trees and the whole natural environment evoke so intensely death, blood and the weight of history ? How does the present call up the past ? And how does this past, with a mere gesture or a simple regard, haunt and torment you as you wander along an empty cotton field or a dusty country road ?". (Chantal Akerman)