The Abandonment
By Christian Morisot
It seems to me that The Abandonment is unsettling because it dares to show what our era prefers to avoid.
Not through slogans or militant rhetoric, but through silences, glances, and acts of renunciation.
Because changing words doesn't transform reality.
One can multiply rhetorical precautions and shift responsibilities to the margins of language; the core issue remains: Islamism kills.
The film says nothing else—and in this, it echoes the words of many Muslims who supported Samuel Paty before fear prevailed.
It seems to me that The Abandonment is unsettling because it dares to show what our era prefers to avoid.
Not through slogans or militant rhetoric, but through silences, glances, and acts of renunciation.
Because changing words doesn't transform reality.
One can multiply rhetorical precautions and shift responsibilities to the margins of language; the core issue remains: Islamism kills.
The film says nothing else—and in this, it echoes the words of many Muslims who supported Samuel Paty before fear prevailed.
The dishonesty of some of the criticisms leveled at the film lies in conflating criticism of fundamentalism with an attack on a religion. As if it had become impossible to distinguish a faith lived peacefully from a totalitarian ideology that instrumentalizes this faith to impose fear and silence.
So one question remains: why such unease surrounding this film, even in the silences of the Cannes Film Festival, which nonetheless gave it a standing ovation? Why this almost nervous, even schizophrenic, caution whenever a work addresses radical Islamism?
Undoubtedly because The Abandonment doesn't simply recount a crime.
It also recounts a series of collective failures: administrative cowardice, human abandonment, institutional caution that has become more important than the truth.
Because Samuel Paty wasn't just the victim of a fanatic. He was also left alone. Alone facing pressure, absurd accusations, the calculations of some, and the silences of others.
The film depicts this downward spiral with suffocating restraint: the fear of speaking out, the fear of being accused, the fear of "making generalizations," until the point where no one dares to clearly defend what should be self-evident.
And meanwhile, teachers continue to testify—often anonymously—to a deteriorating climate. Religious pressure, rejection of certain teachings, pervasive intimidation. Not fantasies, but subtle signs that many prefer to downplay until the day they become impossible to deny.
Then the word "abandonment" takes on a terrible meaning. It no longer refers simply to an abandoned individual, but to a society that is gradually losing the courage to confront certain realities.
Behind the carefully chosen words and rhetorical contortions lies a raw truth: Samuel Paty was beheaded to the cry of "Allahu Akbar."
This single sentence is enough to explain the unease.
Because it brutally brings reality back into the heart of the discourse.
That is why this film is so disturbing. Because it doesn't just speak of an assassination. It also speaks of everything surrounding this assassination that has chosen to look away.
So one question remains: why such unease surrounding this film, even in the silences of the Cannes Film Festival, which nonetheless gave it a standing ovation? Why this almost nervous, even schizophrenic, caution whenever a work addresses radical Islamism?
Undoubtedly because The Abandonment doesn't simply recount a crime.
It also recounts a series of collective failures: administrative cowardice, human abandonment, institutional caution that has become more important than the truth.
Because Samuel Paty wasn't just the victim of a fanatic. He was also left alone. Alone facing pressure, absurd accusations, the calculations of some, and the silences of others.
The film depicts this downward spiral with suffocating restraint: the fear of speaking out, the fear of being accused, the fear of "making generalizations," until the point where no one dares to clearly defend what should be self-evident.
And meanwhile, teachers continue to testify—often anonymously—to a deteriorating climate. Religious pressure, rejection of certain teachings, pervasive intimidation. Not fantasies, but subtle signs that many prefer to downplay until the day they become impossible to deny.
Then the word "abandonment" takes on a terrible meaning. It no longer refers simply to an abandoned individual, but to a society that is gradually losing the courage to confront certain realities.
Behind the carefully chosen words and rhetorical contortions lies a raw truth: Samuel Paty was beheaded to the cry of "Allahu Akbar."
This single sentence is enough to explain the unease.
Because it brutally brings reality back into the heart of the discourse.
That is why this film is so disturbing. Because it doesn't just speak of an assassination. It also speaks of everything surrounding this assassination that has chosen to look away.