Five days after the death of Jean-Marie Le Pen, France 5 is broadcasting this Sunday, January 12, in prime time, a new documentary on the founder of the National Front. Co-directed by Raphaël Tresanini and Jean-Pierre Canet, the television object in three parts, entitled Jean-Marie Le Pen: To the extremerecalls who the man was who died at the age of 96, in a faithful portrait of the far-right leader who considerably influenced political life in recent decades. Multiple convictions for inciting racial hatred, for homophobia, and for contesting crimes against humanity, Marine Le Pen’s father became famous for his sordid spitting on the gas chambers, a “point of detail” of the Second World War, according to him. He spent thirty-five years in the European Parliament doing nothing, and participated unsuccessfully in five presidential elections.
The documentary shows him in several facets: strategist, tribune, opportunist, xenophobic, liar, violent, pretentious, but above all as the main purveyor of modern national-populism in France. The co-directors met Jean-Marie le Pen in April 2022, and interviewed several of his relatives, including his daughter Marine Le Pen and his ex-wife Pierrette, former MEP Marie-Christine Arnautu. They had access to numerous unpublished archives of the “Old Man” and the National Front, in the cellar of Montretout, the manor on the heights of Saint-Cloud, which he inherited from Hubert Lambert, a wealthy cement manufacturer who died in 1976. Nothing is not forgotten: from his past as a milouf and torturer during the Algerian war, to the financing of his 1988 campaign by the Moon sect, to the gold bars found in Montretout and believed to have been hidden in a bank in Switzerland. But also his visceral anti-Semitism, described by the former mayor of Nice Jacques Peyrat: «Il [voyait] Jews everywhere, they [crachait] in the mouth.” From the launch of the FN in 1972 with those nostalgic for Vichy, admirers of Pétain, former members of the OAS and former unrepentant collaborators, to its surprise accession to the second round of the 2002 presidential election.
In the 1980s, 78% of French people declared themselves hostile to Jean-Marie Le Pen, today his daughter brings together 9 million voters in the presidential election, and his party has brought 126 deputies to the National Assembly. His rise, like that of his daughter later, coincides with the rise of racist crimes in France. His former right-hand man Lorrain de Saint-Affrique, however, notices his contribution to the French political camp. “Jean-Marie is a first name with extremely strong connotations, he said. Today, you say “François”, no one says “hey, Mitterrand”. On the other hand, if you call a little boy “Jean-Marie”, everyone thinks of something. “I vote for Jean-Marie”, everyone understands what that means.” A bit like Adolf.
