A dispute opposes the President of the Chain, Christopher Baldelli, and the journalist Hélène rising, at the head of the documentary pole since 2009, around the diffusion of a film about the occupation, November 6, 2021.
by
The information is not yet official, but it already makes great noise among documentary producers: the head of these programs for the public parliamentary chain Senate, Hélène Risser, is dismissed. The journalist, arrival on the chain in February 2006, received his letter on January 6, after a prior interview with the President, Christopher Baldelli, three days earlier. Main reason invoked: serious failures to its professional obligations as part of the preparation of a documentary produced by the company, please turn (TSVP). The director of the antenna and programs, Jean-Philippe Lefèvre, the oldest employee of the chain (he arrived in February 2000), is also on departure.
At the origin of the dispute between the journalist and the president since the 1 June 2021, a sequence of the film René Carmille, a hacker under the occupation, broadcast on November 6th. This first documentary of Youssr Youssef presents itself as the investigation of a student, freshly graduated from ENSAE (the National School of Statistics and Economic Administration) on the founder of his school, creator under the occupation of the National Statistics Service, Future INSEE.
Adopting a tone resolutely candid, even naive, the young woman launches his story around this question: in the summer of 1940, between the signing of the armistice and the beginning of the collaboration, Philippe Pétain knew that René Carmille put his skills in the service of an ultra-secret project remobilization of combatants against the Nazi occupant? And he, the collaborationist struck by national indignity in 1945, he would have let him know what causes?
The answer, obviously negative and unequivocal, is brought several times during the film by different historians. But this introductory sequence shocks Christopher Baldelli to the point that, three days before the diffusion of the documentary, he asks that be removed the two minutes of the film which, in his eyes, pose “a major problem”, likely to expose the chain to a chain accusation of “complicity of revisionism”. In total disagree with this reading, Hélène Risser contests any ambiguity, but still turns to the producer to rebody this passage.
“Willingness to reorganize the editorial line”
“At the time, Eric Zemmour had just made controversy by pretending that Petain had saved French Jews, justifies Christophe burned, editor-in-chief at TSVP. We changed the film at the request of Christopher Baldelli because the context was sensitive. Not at all because it was tainted by the slightest hint of revisionism. In this case, we take a lost ball. “At the end of October, 2021, the film had been projected in preview at 200 people, including historians, But also sent to the press (Historia, Le Monde, Obs, Telerama, etc.). “He had only received good reviews,” says an employee of the chain.
You have 36.64% of this article to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.