Kichka: Life is a cartoon (2018)

Michel Kichka (born 1954 in Liège) is a renowned cartoonist and illustrator living in Jerusalem. In his graphic novel Second Generation, he addresses the impact the traumatization of his father, Holocaust survivor Henri Kichka (born 1926 in Brussels), had on him and his siblings. The publication forms the beginning of a long journey through the past into the future. The film follows father and son Kichka during two intensive years in Israel, Belgium, France with many interlocutors. In one of the most intense moments of the film, father and son go to the place where Henri was arrested by the Gestapo in 1942. The 63-year-old Michel has never been there before, the 91-year-old Henri avoids this place, which for him is filled with the worst feelings ever, it manifests in him the second that was to change his life forever horrible. 'Kichka' shows what power the cartoon can have, how father and son could only talk to each other through this art. However, the film goes far beyond the topic of the graphic novel, shows how both Kichkas recapitulate the family history, how they talk about the work of the father as a witness and author. Kichka discusses the responsibilities of the second generation with Beate and Serge Klarsfeld, some others. In conversation with Plantu, the cartoonist of the newspaper 'Le Monde' and initiator of 'Cartooning for Peace', the movie leaves the subject of Shoa and devotes itself to the wide field of political caricature and comic art itself.