The Flag reflects on the aftermath of the 2015 Paris attacks, exploring the decline of civil liberties as local media and politics continue othering Arab and African communities.

The Flag

In festivals across Europe.

Projections
May 30	Rome	Italy
June 01	Rome	Italy
June 06	Castelnaudary	France
June 07	Carcassonne	France
September 20	Thorens-Glières	France
Archive →

	2024	UnArchive Found Footage Festival
	2024	FIFDH
	2023	Festival des Libertés
	2023	Nuremberg International Human Rights Film Festival
	2023	États généraux du film documentaire
	2023	Movies that matter
	2023	One World
	2023	CPH DOX
	2021	IDFA Forum

Yasser, a human rights activist, travels around Paris to deliver a message that no one wants to hear. Juxtaposing current events with archival material, Joseph and Yasser seek to understand why our freedoms have been in steady decline for several years. The Flag’ begins the day after the attacks of 13th November 2015 in Paris, France. It documents the intensification of security measures, the decline in civil liberties, from the rule of law, and goes to meet those who are subjected to its effects and who together try to resist it or survive; citizens of the Muslim confession in Nice, grieving the attacks of 14th July, of up to a third of the victims and their exclusion the day after; families in the Paris suburbs, victims of police persecutions since the state of emergency was declared; or in Paris and Calais, exiled communities and French citizens campaigning beside them.

Alternately, going over some key events of the last thirty years, the film analyses the progressive and methodical construction of a political discourse that has become widespread to the point of becoming commonplace. This official narrative aims to point out the ‘enemies within’.

A furious, iconoclastic attack on power and the media in a modern France where Islamophobia has become mainstream and inequality is growing from the suburbs to the boulevards.
Cph dox →

Director Joseph Paris filmed dozens of hours of interviews and collected a large amount of material from the French media. From the fragments of these he has compiled a visual essay on the decline of civil liberties in France.
One World →

Following the 2015 terrorist attacks in Paris, France declared the state of emergency. This set in motion an exit from the rule of law, with Muslims as the first, but not the only victims. Urgent, philosophical and visually interesting plea in defence of civil liberties and equality.
Movies that matter →

A provocative depiction to the barely-hidden Islamophobia that exists in France, experimental filmmaker Joseph Paris exposes the malevolent media dynamics and the draconian state powers the government has operationalised following the attacks in Paris & Nice in 2015-6.
Radical Art Review →

Joseph Paris fell into a state of mourning following the Paris terror attacks of 13 November, 2015, in which 130 people were killed and more than 350 injured in coordinated assaults across the French capital. It was the deadliest attack on French soil in modern history and left the country in a state of shock. However, the filmmaker was also alarmed by the government response.
Hyphen →

Collages, split-screens and a Guy Debordian vandalisation of the (media) image itself testify to Joseph Paris’ active background in the ‘copyleft’ movement and video art. An alarming and radically critical report from a time when social divisions are widening and clashes between state power and civilians are on the rise.
Cph dox →