Dakar desperado

Cocky rapper MC Jean Gab’1 on racism,
steroids and starring in the French
neo-blaxploitation pic Black

RAP ATTACK: MC Jean Gab’1

by CHRISTOPHER SYKES

“It was like a childhood dream to have the lead,” says rapper-turned-actor MC Jean Gab’1. “When I was young, I wanted to be in 48 Hours or Beverly Hills Cop.”

I catch myself laughing only a few seconds into the interview with the bulky Frenchman because, watching the North American premiere of Black at Fantasia a few hours prior, I couldn’t help chuckle to a friend that Gab’1 is Eddie Murphy’s ripped, Parisian doppelganger. Little did I know the rap star would draw the same conclusion: “Basically, I’m Eddie Murphy on steroids.”

The brawn comes in handy from the film’s opening scene. As a neo-blaxploitation heist flick shot on a shoestring in Paris and Senegal, Black stands up remarkably well as a psychedelic homage to ’70s era B-movies. After a botched robbery in Paris’s 18th arrondissement, the quick-thinking Black (perfectly turned by MC Jean Gab’1 in his first lead role) is the sole survivor and finds himself on a plane to Dakar in search of a shipment of diamonds and his identity.

“The idea was to create this mythical character called Black,” explains first-time director Pierre Laffargue. “It’s obviously a surname, but behind that, he’s also representing a lot of clichés. We see from the first scene that he’s brilliant under pressure and always escapes. We wanted to take the audience inside this heist movie and then suddenly cut it, where Black is all alone in a country he thinks he knows, but doesn’t.”

When your film stars one of the biggest French rappers in the game, it’s a given that the music is going to get special attention. Whatever Black lacks in special effects, it more than makes up for with a bumping soundtrack that brings as much to the film’s atmosphere as Guy Ritchie’s Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.

“I wanted to avoid clichés—I didn’t want any hip hop, for instance”, says Laffargue. “I focused on using music with a ’70s theme. There’s plenty of funk in the beginning, as funk was obviously the music of the blaxploitation movies, but I also wanted a colourful soundtrack filled with different hues, so lots of Afrobeat and afro-jazz.”

It’s a wise decision to stay away from hip hop, as the film’s final reel takes the viewer on a surreal hunt sequence that culminates in a fusion of African mysticism (not worth spoiling) and an old-school, gun-blazing shootout in Dakar. Even when the film does begin to sway towards the ridiculous, the tongue-in-cheek physical comedy of Gab’1 reminds the viewer you’re there to be entertained, not to worry about the plot’s loose strings.

BEING THE ANTI ANTI-HERO

I bring up a parallel between the rap career of Gab’1 (he made waves calling out the entire French rap corps in his most famous track “J’t’emmerde”) and Black by way of his ostentatious character extending what amounts to a two-hour-long “fuck you” to the blaxploitation anti-heroes of the ’70s. “I love it when people hate me. It gives me a kick. When I started making rap, people were saying, ‘This shit’s not for you.’ So I made rap behind their backs,” Gab’1 chuckles. “Same thing happened with the movie. Everybody told me, ‘You’ll never get the role.’ You gotta ask yourself who had a leading role before me? Like I told y’all, I’m Eddie Murphy on steroids. If you look at some of his movies from back in the day now, you’re gonna laugh, ’cause nigger’s skinny as shit.”

As we’re wrapping up the interview, I ask Gab’1 in passing what it’s like making an all-black film for the French market. The frustration in his voice is evident. “This is a big fucking problem. I got no doubt this movie’s gonna do something, but first we’ve gotta fight our homeland: France. You’ve always got the racist problem. They say this movie is made by the blacks for the blacks. Shut the fuck up. You go and see a Bruce Lee flick or a Jackie Chan flick, you ever see some Chinese guy in the theatre? It’s nonsense. It’s about racism. It’s like you’re a monkey with words. The slavery shit didn’t start in the States. We’ve been in France for over 400 years. I was born in your land; I grew up in your land. I talk like y’all and I’m probably fucking your daughter or your sister. So it’s all bullshit.”

BLACK OPENS THIS FRIDAY, JULY 31