As afilm director, producer and screenwriter from Martinique, Christophe Agelan is someone who is wholly committed to telling quintessentially French Caribbean and Creole stories on the big screen.
On an island with a negligible homegrown cinematic infrastructure – perhaps surprising, given the international success of Euzhan Palcy’s iconic, award-winning, 1983 film Rue Cases-Nègres, Agelan is determined to rejuvenate and galvanise the nascent local film industry with his own production company. As he explains somewhat forlornly, tired of being a lone artistic voice, “To this day there are very few Martinican cinematic productions. I’m the only one who is producing movies at the moment.”
Career In the Film Industry
His journey to becoming a film producer has, it must be said, been slightly unusual, driven solely by his love of films. As he admits, “This really started as a passion which I then developed. I created a production company simply because I liked films.”
Agelan’s production company, in which he is the producer, is based in Martinique and has as its raison d’être “a vocation to make movies in Creole in the Caribbean on all levels, from the literature to the filming process to the production as well.”
Consumed with an undeniable ardour for his métier, he continues, “The objective is to the use the resources that we have, such as the techniques and the technicians, to make the movies, because more often than not we come to Martinique and Guadeloupe with stories that don’t correspond to our world.”
In terms of the film genres that they produce, Agelan’s company mostly make thrillers and dramas. He then laughs, asserting with a wry smile, “We definitely don’t do comedy.”
Agelan set up his production company in 2012 and since then has made about a dozen film on various topics, stressing that “they have always been of top quality.” However, his breakthrough came with his most recent film Wayav Wawa which finally brought him the international attention and critical acclaim he has long rightfully deserved. “The last film we did, Wayav Wawa, was shown at many films festivals, not only in the Caribbean, but also in Paris and the US. We even won some prizes!” Adding happily with discernible pride in his voice, “That film really took us to the next level and surpassed all our expectations.”
Inspiration For His Films
Remarkably clear about the ideological inspiration for his films, Agelan states that there are in particular two main themes which he tries to address in his work – namely challenging social taboos (important on a socially conservative, Catholic island like Martinique) and highlighting specifically Martinican stories, narratives and, on occasion, even tragedies which have been hitherto neglected and overlooked by the mainstream media.
“Especially in the West Indies, we’ve always wanted to defend subject matters that pertain to real life that are seen as taboo, such as homosexuality. There was also a plane crash in 2005 in which many Martinicans died in Venezuela, so we made a film about that, in order to tell the story, in order to memorialise them and not to forget the tragedy that happened.”
Agelan then recalls a film he made which was set against a very specific historical and socio-political backdrop – in this case, the 2009 workers’ strike, which greatly affected Martinique. “That was a very tough time for the island. No one was coming in or out. The strike was really bad and there was a lot of pressure and tension that was building up on the island. The movie had great success in Paris, in New York and in the US as a whole.”
Thankfully for Agelan, more opportunities came from that success. As he remembers, “This led to a new project called Arifa – which is a film about a guardian who helps us reconnect with our island past and with our spiritual conscience. That spirituality is based in the (West African) Yoruba tradition. So, this is what we based the film on – the spirit of Arifa who looked into her background for help, and the story evolved around that.”
Scripts Which Blend Reality And Fiction
When writing a film script, Agelan derives his ideas from both reality and fiction, thanks to his keen eye for compelling news stories and also his copious, discursive imagination. As he explains, “We do a mixture of reality and fiction. For example, with the (Harvey) Weinstein affair, we wrote something that blended reality with fiction. We made a film called Boc where we used a (body) double – someone that looks like Weinstein – and acted like him, but under a different name. So we change reality around a bit to fit within the world of cinema.”
Concerning cinematic ideas inspired by reality, Agelan has also recently made two films about drug mules – Le Mulage Zimle and Les Mulage Invisibles, both heavily based on the quotidian realities of life in some of Martinique’s less salubrious neighbourhoods and addressing the widespread scourge of drug-smuggling (from South America) which is devastating the island’s social fabric and close sense of community. As he says with a mixture of sadness, consternation and alarm, “There are so many drug mules! Just last week there was a Martinican man who was caught with 100 kg of cocaine. The problem with drug mules in the West Indies and in Martinique is enormous.”
Elucidating his creative process from first seeing the drug bust reported in the newspapers to the conception of the idea for his film, he says, “We read about this case and all the stories that came with it and we thought that that was interesting, so we took the time to read up and inform ourselves and also to set up a team that would best represent this story.”
Immensely proud of his production team’s ability to seamlessly fuse and embellish fact with fiction, he states with admiration, “I love the way in which they can look at real events and be able to then merge that with fiction in order to tell a story.”
Involving Young People in His Films
Agelan is always enthusiastic to involve young people in his productions and relishes working with them. As he explains, young people were actively involved in all aspects of the filming and production of Les Mules, a decision which also had a consciously didactic purpose. “We hired young people. It was also a directive from our organisation that we had more young people, to help them see different sectors to work in the film industry and we used this as a foundational experience for them. We integrated them very well, but we had to teach them pretty much everything. The objective was also to transmit to the younger generation one of the ways you can show the negative effects of drugs and drug use.”
Caribbean Film Association
Sadly, according to Agelan, whilst there does exist a Caribbean Film Union, of which he is a member, and a Caribbean Association of Screen Writers, to date no films have been made together, despite a mutual desire amongst its members to collaborate. As he admits, “Even if it’s one of our objectives to try and do a project together, it’s been a long time and we haven’t made one yet, as it’s quite difficult.”
The Concept Behind His Films
Agelan’s films are also by their very nature extremely Caribbean in essence. “They are Caribbean films, as we have all the influences. They are not French films, even if they shares many traits. They’re a bit more like American action films mixed with a Caribbean film, as Caribbean films always have a lot of colours. I enjoy seeing the colour telling the story and setting the moods which correspond to the scene.”
Use of Music
Music is also instrumental to Agelan’s films and of seminal importance to his production aesthetic. As he relates, “This also plays into the choice of music that is used, be it original music that we’ve had to compose, as it all gives an air to the movie. In Les Mules, we use music a lot to tell the story. For example, many times there is trap music in the background which we use to set a rhythm, even if it’s not something that most people are into.”
Using music to showcase the racial and cultural diversity of the Caribbean is something which definitely matters to Agelan. “Such music also serves to show the diversity of different people that exist in the Caribbean. We are definitely a melting pot, with so many differences and that’s what we’re trying to show in our films.”
Languages The Films Are In
Agelan’s films are mainly in French and Creole, but as he concedes, “very often they have subtitles in English.”
Naturally keen to tap into the lucrative Anglophone market, he says with an astute business acumen, “With the Mules project I want it to be in both. I know that many English speakers don’t like to watch translated movies, but it’s an opportunity to see the film in a different light, instead of just watching it with subtitles.”
How Long it Takes to Write a Script
The length of time it takes Agelan to write a film script varies greatly, being anywhere from between three months to two years, and depends on several factors. As he painstakingly spells out, “With the Invisible Mules, it took us three months, but we didn’t write it all. We took a script that already existed, and we edited it, shortened it as it was too long, and we made something completely new out of it, even if we kept the same main base concept. With the Arifa script, it took us two years. It was like a never-ending experience! We had to make so many changes until we were satisfied with the end product.”
Film Budgets and Funding
Similarly, film budgets for Agelan’s productions vary enormously. In an industry perennially counting the cash, and attempting to source new money, Agelan is both an aesthete and a pragmatist, understanding the need to marry high-minded artistic sensibilities with the often harsh fiscal constraints of small budgets. As he says, “It really depends on the film. Arifa and Tour de Mignons originally had higher budgets, but we had to reduce them. Today we can make a movie from half a million up to 2 million euros, but we need to be cautious of the tax, as there are so many taxes in France and this can add up and get very expensive. We also have the salaries of the crew and everything to take into account.”
Securing funding is another perpetual challenge for producers making the kind of low-budget independent films Agelan’s company specialise in. He acknowleges, “For the Mules Invisibles, we had a main financer, but we also then had to go find sponsors and partners and other things we got for free which helped us out when working with a very small budget. We really had to push ourselves to make that one, but we can also see from this that we need sponsors or friends that can really help you out.”
Film Duration
Agelan’s films also vary in duration. Having made many short films of 10 – 20 minutes length in the past, he is now focusing almost exclusively on feature length films. His latest, Les Mules Invisibles – currently in post-production and seeking a distributor – is about 1 hour 40 minutes long.
Awards and Achievements
Since 2012, Agelan has built up a sizeable body of work and his films are increasingly beginning to gain local recognition, grass roots traction and also win critical acclaim. He won Best Movie and Best Cinematography for the short film Guava and his feature film Wayav Wawa won several coveted prizes on the international film festival circuit.
Future Plans for Directing and Producing
Optimistic and driven, Agelan has big ambitions for the distribution of his films, wanting to have the largest possible platform and the largest possible audience for his work. Yet as a dedicated auteur, a cinephile and a purist, he would still like them to be shown in cinemas where they can move and touch people. “I am interested in having my movies on platforms such as Netflix, but my main wish is to see them in the cinema first. But ultimately I just want people to see my movies.”
Agelan would also like to see more emphasis being placed on locally set, French Caribbean films. “I want to see more films and TV series that are based in Martinique and Guadeloupe. I think there is a real potential for that and for the Caribbean in general, but when focusing on here it could also be a good way of promoting our industry to people abroad. We are not focused on France. Instead we are focused on here and are a lot more open.”
Creole Culture Embedded in His Films
Agelan’s films are all deeply imbued with Creole culture on a multiplicity of levels. As he readily makes clear, “There’s always a Creole influence, as we work with so many people and we all mix and bring our Creole identity. It’s a complex identity, but we all bring something.”
Commenting on the challenges inherent in correctly lighting darker skin tones, Agelan continues, “For example, it’s hard to get the lighting to catch the correct skin tones, especially the darker skin tones, so we work very hard in order to capture everyone very well.”
Likewise, Caribbean sounds, Creole dialogue and the rhythms and cadences of Martinican speech are also all exceedingly important to Agelan in his films. “With the sound, we try our best to capture the Caribbean sound and culture in the movies. And with the Creole language, we always write the scripts in Creole and the actors are then able to add their own improvised bits in Creole as well. This really helps to bring the culture out. It’s way more than the language, it’s the culture as well.”
What it Means to be Creole
Whilst inordinately proud of his Creole heritage, Agelan concedes that, in his opinion, being Creole in a Martinican context is complicated. He then proceeds to give what amounts to a beautiful, poetic and insightful answer to the perennial question of Creole identity.
“What is a Creole? Well, it’s complicated, especially here in Martinique. A Creole person to me is a type of poetry which comes out and is expressed in different ways through who we are.” He adds, duly praising the subtleties and linguistic felicities of his native Creole language, “The best example of doing something our own way which I can think of is using the Creole language itself to express words and ideas that don’t exist in the French and English languages, and the only way to understand it is if you are Creole. We even have our own ways of speaking and intonations and inflections that change the meaning of everything that is being said and only someone who is Creole will know what you mean.”
Agelan is also a proponent of a certain, esoteric Creole attitude which he feels tangibly contributes to the veracity of his film productions. “It’s the attitude that comes with the mix that also makes us Creole and that has influenced our art, our music and our culture.”
On the fusion of cultures in the Caribbean and the thorny zeitgeist issue of “cultural appropriation”, he says sagely, “There is sometimes a controversy, as it boils down to “Is this your culture or is this appropriation of the culture of others?” This shows you the background that is also so mixed. These arguments also make sense, but at the same time it has become its own culture which we call Creole.”
Conclusion
Christophe Agelan is profoundly committed to establishing a thriving film industry in Martinique – something for which he should be lauded. Eager to finally tell French Caribbean stories and to address what it means to be Creole in his films, as well as employing local acting talent and crew, he hopes that his production company can go from strength to strength and continue to safely navigate the somewhat turbulent fiscal seas which often thwart so many low-budget, independent film productions.
With his irrepressible zeal, focused desire and distinctive creative vision, maybe one day Agelan can help make Martinique the cinematic rival of Hollywood, Nollywood or even Bollywood! His unwavering commitment to quality film making, his yearning to treat important social themes and his need to tell historically significant, meaningful stories which resonate with Martinican people all indicate that Agelan will go far.
A future Steven Spielberg or George Lucas of the Antilles? Who knows? But, lest we forget, mighty oak trees grow from tiny acorns. I for one long to see Agelan’s films reaching cinemas worldwide and touching global audiences’ hearts and minds, resonating with their unique French Caribbean flavour and unashamed Creole spirit.