Experiencing Interruptions?

Déconnectés / Disconnected

We are in the midst of a climate emergency. Despite this, Belgium has decided to build a new motorway in the Couvin region, to the great displeasure of the inhabitants of Brûly, who will see their life turned upside down by a colossal construction site. Déconnectés tells the story, over five years, of the forgotten fate of this small village that falls victim to globalisation.

  • Valéry Mahy
    Director
  • Maximilien Charlier
    Producer
    Le Ministre des Poubelles, Saint-Nicolas est Socialiste
  • Antoine Sanchez
    Producer
  • Quentin Noirfalisse
    Producer
  • Dancing Dog Productions
    Producer
  • Valéry Mahy
    Writer
  • Project Title (Original Language):
    Déconnectés
  • Project Type:
    Documentary, Feature
  • Genres:
    Environement, Social
  • Runtime:
    52 minutes
  • Completion Date:
    October 16, 2020
  • Production Budget:
    145,000 EUR
  • Country of Origin:
    Belgium
  • Country of Filming:
    Belgium
  • Language:
    French
  • Shooting Format:
    Digital - Canon
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    Yes
  • Student Project:
    No
Director Biography - Valéry Mahy

Valéry Mahy (1978) is a journalist and director. After studying cinema and journalism, he joined the RTBF (Belgian Francophone Public Television). There he directed reports and investigations for a variety of news programmes. (Au Quotidien, le JT, On n’Est Pas Des Pigeons, Questions à la Une). Originally from Brûly, the village the motorway crosses through, he seized upon the event to tell its story through the eyes of those condemned to live with it on a daily basis. His first long format documentary shoot, it took place over the course of over five years.

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Director Statement

This film is a dive into my village, Brûly, a few kilometres from Couvin. A slice of countryside on the outskirts of society, populated by outsiders, keepers of the last vestiges of Wallonian country life. Against the backdrop of this devitalising landscape, I paint a picture of rural life transformed by the construction of a motorway. It felt to me like the perfect device to document what happens on the sidelines of events like these: a community in distress, forgotten by those in power in favour of monstrous ventures. The motorway’s neighbours, those left behind in the development of such a project, must now live in a completely transformed environment.
Others, supposed beneficiaries of the motorway, are also part of the patchwork of the film. I wished to reveal the story that hides behind the uprooting of those who are participants, but also victims, in a transactional world. The tale of Spanish prostitutes in a brothel close to the motorway or of displaced Romanian builders put to work on its construction is realistically not much more enviable than that of the local community.
In filming these works that symbolise the excess and failings of our speed-driven society, my intention was to cast them in a critical light. In forever prioritising interconnection, exchange, globalisation, all through the transport of manpower and merchandise (primarily by reducing time and, therefore, distance), society acts in opposition to local concerns, issues that are more personal and, in my eyes, more important. Concerns such as the fight against poverty and pollution, work as fulfilment rather than servitude, the protection of the environment as opposed to its inevitable sidelining in favour of economic interests.
The film recounts the coming together of the many rich layers of society: that of the macrocosm and its globalising energy and the microcosm of a small village. Throughout history, expansive public projects have never failed to take collateral victims and to conceal them. Unable to bring them justice, telling their story is an act of paying tribute. The film also gives us the opportunity to reflect on the direction our transactional society has taken and on the limits that we may one day have to put in place.