After a first opus released in 2004, Luc Besson decided to produce a sequel to “Banlieue 13” soberly titled “Banlieue 13: Ultimatum”. A sequel that found itself at the center of an unexpected controversy in relation to the cinemas of the UGC group.
Commuter 13 Ultimatum : a more explosive sequel
In 2004, Pierre Morel staged District 13, a yamakasis film in the Parisian suburbs carried by Cyril Raffaelli and David Belle. Four years later, Luc Besson, via his box EuropaCorp, decides to launch the sequel: Suburb 13: Ultimatum.
Patrick Alessandrin (August 15th) succeeds Pierre Morel behind the camera. As for Cyril Raffaelli and David Belle, they are both back in the shoes of the two protagonists of the license. And if this sequel received less positive reviews, in particular because of a sometimes excessive and not very credible action escalation, the feature film nevertheless generated more than 14 million dollars at the international box office.
A social scandal
At the time of its release, Ultimatum found himself at the heart of an unexpected and social controversy. Indeed, the UGC group has refused to broadcast Patrick Alessandrin’s feature film in some of its cinemasfor, supposedly, security reasons. Suburb 13: Ultimatum was thus not programmed in the cinemas of Rosny-sous-Bois and Les Ulis, areas deemed sensitive by the group. Faced with this social discrimination, Luc Besson stepped up to highlight this preferential treatment put in place by UGC.
The director was notably supported by comedian Philippe Torretonwho embodies the President of the Republic in Suburb 13: Ultimatum. The actor spoke at the time of ” racial discrimination “ towards suburban audiences, deprived of feature films. Luc Besson then said, February 23, 2009, at the microphone of Europe 1 (via the JDD) that :
UGC made it clear to me that they no longer wanted that audience. To me, that’s just racism.
Despite this dissatisfaction of Luc Besson and part of his team, the UGC group remained on its positions and refused to schedule Suburb 13: Ultimatum in the aforementioned cinemas.
