INTERNATIONAL CINEMA: NI CHAÎNES NI MAÎTRES
We continue with our series of International Cinema – where we offer the best foreign movies with English subtitles. Ni Chaînes Ni Maîtres is the first recent major French feature film to take a look at France’s slavery past. For the screenplay, director Simon Moutaïrou worked closely with historians to make the film as realistic as possible to contribute to awareness of France’s slavery past.
In Ni chaînes ni maîtres, we follow enslaved Mati, who dreams of a free life away from the sugar cane plantation. Tradition has it that somewhere on Île de France (present-day Mauritius) there is a place where former slaves live in freedom. Mati’s father Massamba does not believe any of this, and thinks she had better resign herself to her fate. After all, that is the only chance of survival. When Mati does escape, and the plantation owner hires the notorious slave hunter Madame de la Victoire to capture her, Massamba sees no other option but to throw off his chains and find his daughter, before it is too late.
