The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn, a movie directed by Steven Spielberg and produced by Peter Jackson, is scheduled for release before the end of 2011. The film reportedly combines the stories from three books in the world-famous comics series by Belgian cartoonist Hergé (Georges Remi): The Crab with the Golden Claws, The Secret of the Unicorn and Red Rackham’s Treasure. Most movie-goers will have no idea about the historical context in which these three stories were first drawn and published. All were originally serialized by the cartoonist in Le Soir, a newspaper then controlled by the Nazis during their occupation of Belgium. And in the same newspaper, in between the first of these stories and the other two (which constitute a diptych), Hergé drew and published The Shooting Star, whose original version was clearly an antisemitic libel. This was at a time when the Nazis were preparing to kill the Jews in Belgium. Leafing through those old newspapers is a sobering experience, as one reads positive reviews of antisemitic movies and public speeches, and official notification of administrative measures designed to identify and isolate Jews in preparation for the genocide. Today Hergé is mostly celebrated as a creative comics genius, but historical facts like this should encourage us to delve deeper into the relationships between the form, the content and the context of his comics.
Tag Archives: Mourad Boudjellal
The Colonial Heritage of Comics in French by Mark McKinney
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Posted by Comics Forum on 2011/07/01 in Guest Writers
Tags: adaptation, Africa, Algeria, anti-Semitism, bande dessinée, Barly Baruti, Belgium, colonialism, Congo, Farid Boudjellal, France, Franco-Belgian Comics, Futuropolis, Hergé, History, imperialism, Le Soir, Mourad Boudjellal, Nazi occupation of Belgium, Peter Jackson, Soleil Productions, Steven Spielberg, The Adventures of Tintin, Tintin, USA
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