Moune Ô

by Maxime Jean-Baptiste

Belgium, Guyana, France
2022
16 min
French with English subtitles
Short film
Documentary
Color
DCP

Berlinale Forum 2022

In Competition 2022

Official synopsis

The analysis of images from the preview of a film leads a director to investigate the survival of the colonial heritage in French Guiana, as well as his own family history.

The programmer’s eye

By analysing a short video of the preview of “Jean Galmot l'aventurier”, Maxime Jean-Baptiste weaves a visual, sincere and touching reflection on Guyana as an object of colonisation of the gaze. The strength of “Moune Ô” lies in the articulation that the director offers between his personal dynamics and that of a collective history. With its soundtrack by Josy Massy, whose title “Moune Ô” recalls the essential desire for self-determination, this short film makes the silences of the images that we miss – in which the ghosts of extractivism resound – sing. 


Natacha Seweryn

Biography and Filmography

Born in France in 1993, Maxime Jean-Baptiste is a filmmaker and performer who lives between Brussels and Paris. He holds a Bachelor's degree in Visual Arts from Saint-Luc and a Master's degree in Media Arts from K.A.S.K. School of Arts (Belgium). He grew up in the context of the Guyanese-Caribbean diaspora in France, and his artistic work is seen as an exploration of the complexity of Western colonial history through the detection of past traumas in today’s society. His audiovisual and performative work focuses on portraits through the form of "reenactment" so as to conceive the potentiality of a living and oralised memory.

2022 : MOUNE Ô (SHORT) - Maxime Jean-Baptiste - Director and Screenwriter 

2021 : LISTEN TO THE BEAT OF OUR IMAGES  (SHORT) - Maxime Jean-Baptiste - Director and Screenwriter

2018 : NOU VOIX (SHORT) - Maxime Jean-Baptiste - Director and Screenwriter

Maxime Jean-Baptiste

La Loge

Square Eyes

by Maxime Jean-Baptiste

Born in France in 1993, Maxime Jean-Baptiste is a filmmaker and performer who lives between Brussels and Paris. He holds a Bachelor's degree in Visual Arts from Saint-Luc and a Master's degree in Media Arts from K.A.S.K. School of Arts (Belgium). He grew up in the context of the Guyanese-Caribbean diaspora in France, and his artistic work is seen as an exploration of the complexity of Western colonial history through the detection of past traumas in today’s society. His audiovisual and performative work focuses on portraits through the form of "reenactment" so as to conceive the potentiality of a living and oralised memory.

2022 : MOUNE Ô (SHORT) - Maxime Jean-Baptiste - Director and Screenwriter 

2021 : LISTEN TO THE BEAT OF OUR IMAGES  (SHORT) - Maxime Jean-Baptiste - Director and Screenwriter

2018 : NOU VOIX (SHORT) - Maxime Jean-Baptiste - Director and Screenwriter