The films of Alice Diop are often described as those of the margins, the peripheries, the unseen. For Diop, it has always been the opposite - the "margins" were her social epicentre, where cinema became a necessity.

Growing up in the Parisian commune Aulnay-sous-Bois in a family of Senegalese immigrants, Diop turned her camera on people that surrounded her; on the systemic obstacles they faced, but also on the everyday banalities: family meals, rides on the commuter train RER, intimate conversations. Although it’s easy to label such scenes as peripheral, for Diop it has always been the opposite - it was her social epicentre, where cinema became a necessity.

In partnership with Visions du Réel, the Doc Alliance festival which welcomed Alice Diop to its 2024 Atelier, DAFilms brings you 6 early Diop films exploring the areas on the outskirts of Paris where she grew up. These films “deconstruct the collective imagination that clings to these territories, which are often described from an outside perspective, and whose representations are constantly reduced to anxiety-provoking news footage. Recognised with numerous awards, the coherence of her work gives a voice to communities that are often ignored or even silenced, exploring the personal to access the universal. It is a deeply political approach that also documents French institutional violence – both physical and symbolic.” Read more about the Visions du Réel curatorial analysis on their website.

The films in this focus include:

• RER B (2017, 1 min)
• Towards Tenderness (2015, 40 min)
• Danton's Death (2011, 64 min)
• Les Sénégalaises et la Sénégauloise (2007, 56 min)
• Clichy pour l'exemple (2006, 50 min)
• La Tour du monde (2006, 50 min)