When he looks up from the cup of tea he’s holding, Sangare’s eyes slide delicately over you. The Story of Souleymane, the feature film by Boris Lojkine in which he plays the main character, received, on Friday May 24, the Jury Prize in the Un certain regard section, and the actor, that of best actor.
Or the story of Souleymane, a young Guinean in Paris who, while waiting to obtain his asylum application, juggles life as an illegal worker, cheap labor for bicycle delivery apps, dorm room bustle in soup kitchen, ripped off when possible, living sleepless nights to which we turn a blind eye as long as they do not disturb our own.
Sangare is a mechanic, and he has lived in Amiens for six years. The difference ends there. In real life, the actor has the calm of his cinema alter ego, the same resistance to misery drawing its strength from a peaceful, seemingly unalterable resilience. In the middle of filming, at the corner of Rue de Châteaudun and Rue de Maubeuge, in Paris, a lady breaks down with her car. The director sees Sangare put down his bike, open the hood of the vehicle, dive into the engine, and explain to the lady how to get home with details which, says Boris Lojkine, he himself technically understands nothing… Like his character, Souleymane , the young actor who is also waiting to be regularized, has the generosity of the poor.
Abou Sangare was born on May 7, 2001 in Sinko, in the southeast of Guinea. Scattered habitat, tropical climate, dirt streets. Since independence, the country has experienced its share of coups and political upheavals, of which, like Souleymane, Sangare knows nothing. All this is far from his life. His family lives on mixed crops: rice, cassava, a few cattle. Well, his family… his mother. He did not know his father, of whom she is the second wife. He has an older brother “who comes and goes”, and a sister who found a husband in Conakry. They no longer have contact.
“Devil’s Disease”
At 7 years old, the child is no longer in school but works in a garage. It’s because his mother is sick. “The devil’s disease. » That’s the name they give it there. Epileptic seizures, the origin of which he will never know: genetic, viral, tumor? It was because they did not have the means to hospitalize him that at the age of 15 he decided to “ sgo on an adventure » – leave the country to, like millions of others before him since the world began, seek their fortune.
You have 67.07% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.