RECRUE (REBEL)
Quebec’s Award-Winning Short Film
Recrue (Rebel) is a short Canadian film about illegal immigration and how a six-year-old boy learns to interact with people from the United States who cross into Canada. The director, Pier-Phillipe Chevigny, uses a child’s perspective to illustrate the inhumanity and abuse. Low camera angles and continuous tracking emphasize the youngster’s (Alex) point-of-view as he observes the adults’ harsh treatment.
In 2017, 58,000 migrants crossed the US/Canadian border. They were trying to escape President Trump’s immigration policies. Most of them were sent back to the US after local patrols and guards found them in wooded areas near the border. This 2019 film depicts extremist vigilante patrols. The film shows Alex playing with toys, wrapped up in an imaginary world, and discovering a stray cat. He asks his father to let the cat in the house, but dad says no. Alex then accompanies his dad on a hunting expedition with a group of right-wing extremists and their families. Alex plays ‘hide and seek’ with the other children, but he encounters illegal migrants at the border. Alex tells the adults, and they immediately handcuff the family to ship them back. Young Alex is upset because a young girl, with her parents, is crying. Alex despondently eats his ice cream at home while his dad reassures him that “it was for the best.” Seeing the cat outside, he lets the animal in and gives him a plate of ice cream. This cat symbolizes the immigrant family that the boy accepts, but his family will not.
This movie uses a child’s vantage point, innocence, detachment, and the dad’s beliefs to examine complex politics and topics. Director Chevigny’s vision uniquely shows both sides of immigration. PROVOKR believes it is a worthwhile film about an important issue to explore.
