Bertrand Cantat was once France’s most venerated rockstars – the brooding frontman of cult rock group Noir Desir, and social activist often vaunted as the ‘Jim Morrison of France’.
Cantat spectacularly fell from grace after he brutally murdered actress Marie Trintignant in 2003, sending shockwaves through France where for weeks the press picked over the couple’s doomed ‘love story’.
The musician’s plans to revive his career with a solo album this month have been thwarted by protests, with Cantat finding out that many people, particularly women, will not tolerate his return to the public eye after his release from jail.
Marie Trintignant was repeatedly beaten on the head during an argument with Cantat in a hotel room in Lithuania in 2003, and later died of severe brain damage in a Paris hospital.
Bertrand Cantat(Photo by Erick James/WireImage) Source: WireImage
Cantat, who was convicted and sentenced to eight years prison, was released in 2007 after serving only four.
There’s a long tradition of believing men of talent can be redeemed. That an artist accused of abuses can be excused their misdeeds, because of what the historian Martin Jay coined the ‘artistic alibi’.
Court documents reveal their dispute began after Cantat found messages from Marie’s ex-husband on her phone.
At the time of her death, Marie, 41, was a critically acclaimed actress with five Cesar award nominations, France’s Oscars, to her name. She was the mother of four children.
Cantat was legally forbidden to produce any form of art relating to Trintignant until 2010, after which he reunited briefly with his band before they called it quits.
There’s a long tradition of believing men of talent can be redeemed. That an artist accused of abuses can be excused their misdeeds, because of what the historian Martin Jay coined the ‘artistic alibi’.
Weinstein, Louis CK, Woody Allen and others named by the #MeToo campaign have all flourished and basked in their exalted careers because their artistry has served as an alibi.
In France, the land of ‘open secrets’ the ‘artist’ has long been aided by a culture fiercely protective of the right to keep public and private spheres separated.
Dominique Strauss Kahn, the once hopeful 2012 presidential candidate and former IMF boss, ‘openly’ harassed and abused women for years.
In France, the land of ‘open secrets’ the ‘artist’ has long been aided by a culture fiercely protective of the right to keep public and private spheres separated.
But perhaps the most enduring example is that of Roman Polanski who fled the US for France after being convicted of raping a 13 year-old girl more than 30 years ago. Polanski has worked, received accolades while buttressed by the view that his art is a gift that transcends all.
As contemporary #metoo and #timesup campaigns highlight abuses against women, French activists are now demanding to know how their country can continue to celebrate a man who beat his girlfriend to death.
In stark contrast to the initial tabloid reports of Trintignant’s murder painting the former couple as tragic star-crossed lovers, feminists are loudly protesting that Cantat is more accurately seen as the sordid face of domestic violence.
Cantat had planned a in Normandy but pulled out this month after an online petition against his inclusion gained 75,000 signatures.
The festival organisers had refused to drop him from their line up, saying: “We consider that our only criteria should be artistic.”
Women’s groups and individuals accused them of ‘normalising violence against women’. “By inviting Bertrand Cantat, you condone domestic violence and violence against women,” the petition read.
Women from feminist organisations holding photos of late French actress Marie Trintignant. Source: Getty Images Europe
Marie’s mother Nadine Trintignant also voiced her outrage at Cantat’s attempts to revive his artistic career. “I find it shameful, indecent, disgusting, that he would go onstage,” she said in a TV interview.
Marie’s mother Nadine Trintignant also voiced her outrage at Cantat’s attempts to revive his artistic career. “I find it shameful, indecent, disgusting, that he would go onstage,” she said in a TV interview.
Although Cantat won’t perform at any festivals, he will still perform his scheduled tour concerts. In a Facebook post, he opined ‘that he’d paid his debts’.
“I wish today, as any given citizen, the right to reintegration…. the right to exercise my profession,” Cantat wrote.
Cantat’s right to perform to be judged solely on his ‘artistic merit’, as festival organisers who defended their decision proclaimed, seemed egregious in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein sexual harassment scandal.
Last October as the Weinstein scandal broke, Cantat had a preview of how the public might react to his ‘right to perform’.
For its October 11 issue, Les Inrockuptibles, a French weekly magazine, featured the 53-year-old singer on the cover with a story of how he overcame recent difficulties in his life to reconnect with his creativity.
The French edition of Elle magazine replied with a cover picture of Trintignant and the line ‘In the name of Marie’.
It ran an impassioned editorial, proclaiming the late actress: ‘the face of the 123 anonymous women killed by their partners in France last year, and the 33 women a day who report rapes, and the 216,000 sexual harassment claims reported in France in 2016.'
Source: Elle Magazine
Les Inrockuptibles said it had chosen Cantat for its cover because of his decision to pursue a solo career, but later acknowledged that the choice was “questionable.”
Feminists must have wondered whether the singer was plagued by blind ambition or just tone deaf to the global cacophony of stories of abuses.
Women, politicians and activists publicly slammed the magazine.
“And in the name of what must we endure the promotion of the man who murdered Marie Trintignant with his fists? Let nothing slide,” , France’s gender equality minister, in response to the Inrockuptibles issue.
So what of the case of Cantat? If France permits Cantat to take centre stage at music festivals we elevate him, while at the same time allowing Marie’s death, indeed any life lost to domestic violence, to be cast into the shadows.
Cantat may well have ‘a right to his profession’, as he says, but not if it extinguishes the memory of Marie Trintignant and women like her.
Family violence and mental health services:
- 1800 Respect national helpline 1800 737 732
- Women's Crisis Line 1800 811 811
- Men's Referral Service 1300 766 491
- Lifeline (24 hour crisis line) 131 114
- Relationships Australia 1300 364 277
