Cinema and the Republic
analyzes how contemporary French films represent immigrants as well as the residents of HLMs, suburban low-income housing estates in France. These groups have been and continue to be at the center of heated debates about security in France, and here Jonathan Ervine documents how French filmmakers have responded to such debates. Among the subjects he engages are the representations of undocumented migrants known as
sans-papiers
, the depictions of deportations made possible by the controversial
double peine
law, the relationships between young people and the police in suburban France, and tstereotypes about these groups.