What is “La Fièvre”, the brand new Canal+ sequence written by the creator of “Baron noir” value? | EUROtoday

HAS what does it imply for the beginning of civil warfare in France in 2024? Sometimes a whim, just like the one inflicted by Fodé Thiam (Alassane Diong), star of the fictional membership Racing Paris, on his coach, throughout the end-of-year awards night of the soccer championship. A violent gesture, accompanied by an insult – “dirty toubab” (“white” in Wolof) – and the media machine is triggered first on social networks, then within the media and eventually in public opinion.

The president of the membership, François Marens (Benjamin Biolay), shortly senses the storm brewing and calls on Kairos, a communications firm specializing within the administration of one of these catastrophe, Men in Black. “A media crisis is seventy-two hours,” these communications execs promise the soccer execs. But clearly, nothing goes as deliberate.

A flammable state of affairs

Because on the workforce, Samuel “Sam” Berger (wonderful Nina Meurisse) – her father named her that as a result of he wished a boy – is pretty much as good at fixing different folks's issues as she just isn’t at managing her personal. personal life. Sam doesn't agree together with his boss in any respect; she thinks, conversely, that what is occurring there’s far more flammable than it appears…

Fever, which takes its title from a passage from Yesterday's world by Stefan Zweig, is the newest unique creation from Canal+, broadcast in 6 episodes of 52 minutes from Monday March 18. It is created and written by Éric Benzekri, to whom we owe the wonderful sequence Black Baronwhich handled the behind the scenes of French politics, choice betrayal, corruption and manipulation.

READ ALSO From “Black Baron” to “La Fever”, Éric Benzekri, serial prophetDifficult in reality, after watching the six episodes of Fever – apart from the ultimate scene of episode 6 which stays secret – to not see it as an extension of the universe of Black Baron, even a fourth season, as there are such a lot of bridges between the 2 universes. In the universe described by Benzekri, energy not belongs to politicians however to communicators. And they aren’t all the time full of excellent intentions…

Take Marie Kinsky (Ana Girardot), an influencer, a really right-wing stand-up artist prepared so as to add gasoline to the blaze of protest born from the well-known headbutt. This flip of occasions, she says, “is the September 11th of their living together”, in reference to the disastrous political communication across the slogan “black white beur” after the victory of the French workforce (the true ) throughout the 1998 World Cup. Kinsky is the anti Sam Berger in a method. Moreover, the 2 know one another properly having labored collectively previously in political communication. Are they hiding a darkish secret? Without ever assembly, they may combat towards one another, within the shadows, with tweets, press conferences and communications the place they’re by no means within the foreground however the place one and the opposite The others are clearly pulling the strings.

Football shortly fades into the background. It just isn’t the gamers, the pitch and the outcomes that matter in Feverhowever certainly the repercussions of the selections taken by the membership on workers, supporters and society on the whole.

And what’s all this for? If the situation is breathtaking from begin to end, we additionally get misplaced every so often, like President Marens within the penultimate episode who admits: “I don't even know what we’re anymore. search for “.

Sometimes stammering writing

The fault is a pace that is sometimes too fast, where the characters lack time to assert themselves, where we would like to see other narrative arcs emerge, particularly in terms of the relationship between Marie and Sam. The fault also lies in a writing that oscillates between the very technical (the “filter bubbles”, the “Overton window”, “astroturfing”), the silly (“everyone has the right to happiness”!) and the caricature (the footballers who insult each other with “wesh gros” and who spend their free time playing football video games or influencers exiled in Dubai for whom the sentence “I am an academic and I am participating in a conference” seems too difficult to understand. to understand…).

Despite these slight pitfalls, it’s troublesome to get by way of the six episodes as the principle plot of the sequence shines so intently with present occasions between identification rigidity, information gadgets and mass manipulation on social networks. And we’re delighted {that a} second season already appears sure if we consult with the final episode. Fever rises and it’s not about to fall once more.

Fever on Canal+ from Monday March 18 (two episodes per week) and on MyCanal.fr