“My activism is political, because today, with pedagogy, we obtain nothing.
With polite and well-written letters, signed by important people, we get nothing,” she told the members of the Senate.
This Thursday, February 29, Judith Godrèche pleaded before the Senate women's rights delegation for cinema reform.
She intends to protect young actresses from sexual violence and has extended her fight to all child victims of incest or assault.
“This incestuous family in the cinema is only a reflection of all these families” affected by this violence, she said.
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Judith Godrèche asked the Senate to “establish a commission of inquiry into sexual and gender-based violence in the cinema industry”.
“There must be a whole protection system put in place (around children), and we must stop pretending not to know,” she added.
“I arrived in my theater dressing room, my cheek bruised from a huge slap, I remember having covered my skin with foundation which did not cover anything […].
Everyone knew,” she said to illustrate her point, she who filed a complaint against the filmmakers Benoît Jacquot and Jacques Doillon for facts dating back to her adolescence.
“Never leave a child alone on set”
The actress also defended the project to “impose a neutral referent on filming with a minor”, independent of the production and trained.
A measure aimed in particular at “never leaving a child alone on set”.
She also called for strengthening controls, for example during castings.
Cleaning up in high places
Judith Godrèche did not just defend ideas, she also pointed out certain inconsistent presences within the high authorities of French cinema.
Like that of Dominique Boutonnat, the president of the National Center for Cinema and Animated Images (CNC).
In 2022, the latter was reappointed to his post despite being implicated in a case, not yet judged, of sexual assault on his 21-year-old godson.
Charges that he disputes.
As a reminder, the CNC is the organization in charge of the fight against sexual violence in cinema.
Before the senators, the actress therefore asked for nothing less than the “withdrawal” of Mr Boutonnat.
“Going for training against sexual violence inside the building of an institution whose president himself is accused of sexual violence… What is this joke?”, she quipped.
She also said she broached the subject with Culture Minister Rachida Dati.
“She talked to me about the presumption of innocence,” she said.
I replied that that was not the question, that it was a question of symbol.”