One of the three girls, Zineb, got assaulted by her family friend Zak. The richer girl, Amina, posted the video on social media, showing Zak harassing Zineb and talking about how he want to take down a notorious mobster. So Zak saw part of the video, and got worried about the full video capturing him badmouthing the mobster. That's why he threatened to kill the girls if they do not delete the video.
Amina insists and does go on full feminism and activism mode, but her friends, including the victim, do not agree with her at first. They are worried about their own safety and want to avoid more trouble from Zak. The three girls had a fallout, Amina is kicked out of the group.
Amina is financially secure and lives in a nice neighborhood, so she does not need to worry about her own safety as much while doing activism, but the victim and the other girl are not as privileged. It shows how hard it is to fight for justice, or even accept help when you are underprivileged. It raised a good question about refusing help from those who are more privileged, and whether the more privileged should proactively help those who are viewed as underprivileged, even though they don't want to.
Zak wants a relationship with Zineb. He made advances to Zineb by kissing her even though she is visibly upset, and does not say "yes". Throughout the movie, Zineb never said "no" explicitly to Zak. Even though she told Zak she thinks of him as a brother, she did not directly reject him, might because she is worried about Zak getting violent if he's rejected directly.
She did not tell anyone about the harassment, other than her two friends.
The movie shows how important it is to have sex and legal education at school, as early as possible. It seems consent is not well understood by the teenagers in the movie.
Unfortunately, the adults in the movie also failed to protect the victim. The parents are worried about the safety of Amina as well, because the aggressor is related to a mob.
The teachers and police are absent from the movie. Nobody contacted the teachers or police about the harassment, the social media posts, or the multiple death threats. It's like the teenagers choose to be left to fend for themselves.
A nice detail is that Amina comes from an immigrant family, and her father seems to reject their Arabic ancestry, to an extreme. This caused big issue in his relationship with his daughter. Apparently he internalized racism, and believes it is better to assimilate to the dominant culture, and totally reject the home culture. As the movie is set in France, the attitude towards immigrant culture there seems to be different from Canada. In Canada, immigrants are not expected to abandon the home culture and fully assimilate. It's quite normal for multiple ethnic and cultural identifies to coexist for a person.
Amina insists and does go on full feminism and activism mode, but her friends, including the victim, do not agree with her at first. They are worried about their own safety and want to avoid more trouble from Zak. The three girls had a fallout, Amina is kicked out of the group.
Amina is financially secure and lives in a nice neighborhood, so she does not need to worry about her own safety as much while doing activism, but the victim and the other girl are not as privileged. It shows how hard it is to fight for justice, or even accept help when you are underprivileged. It raised a good question about refusing help from those who are more privileged, and whether the more privileged should proactively help those who are viewed as underprivileged, even though they don't want to.
Zak wants a relationship with Zineb. He made advances to Zineb by kissing her even though she is visibly upset, and does not say "yes". Throughout the movie, Zineb never said "no" explicitly to Zak. Even though she told Zak she thinks of him as a brother, she did not directly reject him, might because she is worried about Zak getting violent if he's rejected directly.
She did not tell anyone about the harassment, other than her two friends.
The movie shows how important it is to have sex and legal education at school, as early as possible. It seems consent is not well understood by the teenagers in the movie.
Unfortunately, the adults in the movie also failed to protect the victim. The parents are worried about the safety of Amina as well, because the aggressor is related to a mob.
The teachers and police are absent from the movie. Nobody contacted the teachers or police about the harassment, the social media posts, or the multiple death threats. It's like the teenagers choose to be left to fend for themselves.
A nice detail is that Amina comes from an immigrant family, and her father seems to reject their Arabic ancestry, to an extreme. This caused big issue in his relationship with his daughter. Apparently he internalized racism, and believes it is better to assimilate to the dominant culture, and totally reject the home culture. As the movie is set in France, the attitude towards immigrant culture there seems to be different from Canada. In Canada, immigrants are not expected to abandon the home culture and fully assimilate. It's quite normal for multiple ethnic and cultural identifies to coexist for a person.
