The Possibility of an Island Read Online Free PDF Page A

example, had a Bentley, like all serious musicians. I could have chosen an Aston Martin, but it was dearer, and anyway the Bentley was better, the hood was longer, you could have lined up three sluts on it with no problem. For 160,000 euros, it was almost a bargain; in any case, as far as credibility among the rabble goes, I think I made a good profit from the investment.
     
     
    That show also marked the beginning of my brief—but lucrative—movie career. I had inserted a short film into the performance; my initial project, entitled
Let’s Drop Miniskirts on Palestine!,
already had that tone of light Islamophobic burlesque which was later going to contribute so much to my renown; but, on Isabelle’s advice, I had had the idea of introducing a touch of anti-Semitism, aimed at counterbalancing the rather anti-Arab nature of the show; it was a wise route to take. I therefore finally opted for a porn film, or rather a parody of a porn film—a genre that, it’s true, is easy to parody—entitled
Munch on My Gaza Strip (My Huge Jewish Settler).
The actresses were authentic Arab immigrant girls, guaranteed to originate from the hardest Parisian suburbs—sluts but veiled, just the right type; we had filmed the outside shots at the Sea of Sand, in Ermenonville. It was comical—a rather elevated form of comedy, that’s true. People had laughed; or at least most people. In an interview with Jamel Debbouze, he described me as a “super-cool dude”; you couldn’t have asked for more. In fact, Jamel had told me just before the program: “I can’t wind you up, dude. We’ve got the same audience.” The TV presenter Marc Fogiel, who had organized the meeting, quickly realized our complicity, and began to shit his pants; I have to admit that for a long time I had been wanting to eviscerate that little prick. But I contained myself: I was very good
—super-cool,
in fact.
    The producers of the show had asked me to cut a part of my short film—a part that, in fact, was not very funny; it had been filmed in a block of flats being demolished in Franconville, but was supposed to take place in East Jerusalem. It involved a dialogue between a terrorist from Hamas and a German tourist that took the form of, at one moment, Pascalian dialectics on the foundations of human identity, and, at another, a meditation on economics—a bit à la Schumpeter. The Palestinian terrorist began by establishing that, on the metaphysical level, the value of the hostage was nil—because he was an infidel; it wasn’t, however, negative, as would have been the case, for example, of a Jew; his destruction was therefore not desirable, it merited simply indifference. On the economic level, however, the value of the hostage was considerable—as he belonged to a rich nation known for showing solidarity with its citizens. Having made these introductory remarks, the Palestinian terrorist carried out a series of experiments. First, he tore out one of the hostages’ teeth—with his bare hands—before observing that his negotiable value had remained unchanged. Then he proceeded to do the same operation on a fingernail—with the help, this time, of pincers. A second terrorist intervened, and a brief discussion took place between the two Palestinians, on a more or less Darwinian basis. In conclusion, they tore off the hostage’s testicles, without omitting to carefully sew up the wound to avoid a premature death. By mutual agreement, they concluded that the biological value of the hostage was the only value to emerge modified from the operation; his metaphysical value remained nil, and his negotiable value very high. In short, it became more and more Pascalian—and, visually, more and more unbearable; incidentally, it was a surprise to me to realize how inexpensive the special effects used in gore movies really were.
    The uncut version of my short film was screened a few months later at the Festival of Strangeness, and it was then that the movie proposals