Page 84 - Alternative Europe Eurotrash and Exploitation Cinema Since 1945

cinema). In official discourses on Belgian cinema, the former has always been pushed forward as the
only desirable goal, whereas the latter has been denied all cultural relevance.
In general, this privileged framework has functioned well in reflecting topical issues of Belgian
cultural identity. Several of the above-mentioned key words of Belgian culture are frequently
represented, in particular realism (in the form of documentary), surrealism (in the form of magic
realism), and social solidarity and particularism (culminating in the struggle of the individual to
escape his smalltown surroundings). But since the Affaire, Belgian culture has changed so dramatically
that this framework no longer captures cultural reality. It refers to a past that, in retrospect, was
disguising some of the more pressing issues that the Affaire placed on Belgium's cultural agenda.
At the very least, then, the Affaire should have led to a willingness to revise the dominant
framework. It should have allowed some attention to elements of the alternative frame of reference,
especially since many of the films around the Affaire and its contexts are characterised by a sense
of immediacy and rawness that is more easily associated with the exploitative and experimental
framework. They deal with terrorism, homosexuality, the different faces of explicit violence, and
they reflect an anarchist attitude towards contemporary culture, desperately (perhaps naively) trying
to understand a culture that is caught up in intense turmoil. But, as the case of S. shows, not many
participants in Belgian cinema culture are willing to make that opening.
As with most of the other films reflecting on the Affaire, it received bad reviews, was prevented
from making a commercial impact (no funding, no opportunities to run in big theatres), and there was
a general tendency to dismiss it as excessive; to forget it as soon as possible. It leads to the interesting
observation that Belgian critics, and most of the official Belgian film discourse (selection committees,
television executives, producers, festival organisers, fellow filmmakers) seem to be unwilling to stay in
touch with a significant part of their own subject.
In the remainder of this chapter I will discuss one particular reason for the film's curious exclusion,
which relates to its ability to not only address certain cultural issues, but also to play a wider role in
supporting and creating attitudes that form part of that culture. In the case of S. this means that it not
only comments on the Affaire (the auteurist framework), but that it is also an example o/^the 'Belgian
disease', exploiting it (the exploitative framework). It explains the particular distinctions between the
intention and reception of S., and it demonstrates the unease of Belgian cinema with the cultural
implications of its subject. In what follows I will focus on one such implication, in order to introduce
a new perspective on the film's meaning and relevance.

S. AND THE HUMAN BODY IN C R I S I S

It is not difficult to make an interpretation of S. On an obvious level the film shows, pretty explicitly,
the actions of a desperate young woman trying to survive (and avenge) the horrible humiliations she
suffers by resorting to the same kind of violence as used against her. This urge for destructiveness i
the ultimate form of resistance - it also almost kills S. Instead of committing suicide, however, S. finds
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comfort with Marie, the only person who has not tried to deceive and/or abuse her. The environment
in which S. tries to survive is depressing: filled with dysfunctional families, unrequited love, crime,
prostitution, sexual violence and abuse, governed by the seductive power of the sex economy. All this

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