“Les Mercredis de l’information” was a regular investigative program on the French general-interest channel TF1 during the 1980’s, and this episode addresses the issue of illegal immigration networks. The 40-minute report, prepared by Jean-Pierre Moscardo and Frederic Laurent, scheduled for prime-time and broadcast on June 23 1982, has dramatic effects. The combination of a catastrophic scenario in the voice-over, confirmed by shocking images and a disturbing music, allows to play on the viewer's sensitivity: fear of the Other, anxiety over the invasion of European countries by illegal immigrants.

            The team was sent to several illegal immigration “hot spots” in order to conduct the survey. The reporters brought back pictures from Belgium, Switzerland, as well as Barcelona, described as the city of smugglers classed as “gangsters” and “procurers”. But special attention is given to the French-Italian border at Ventimiglia, where, a few days earlier, two young Tunisians had died accidentally as they were trying to cross the border through clandestine routes.

            The excerpt shown invites the viewer to watch the dangerous experience of illegal migrants, taking, between Ventimiglia and Menton, paths to circumvent the seaside border-posts of Saint Louis Bridge and Saint Ludovic. This place is known as the “step of the death” owing to the rugged terrain with sheer cliffs overhanging the sea. It has long witnessed the death of hundreds of illegal migrants, who lost their way and crashed into these rocks, often after having been abandoned by Italian, and even Maghrebi or French people smugglers. The report on this place has long been emblematic of illegal immigration, and brings into relief an organized illegal border-crossing system, which certainly confirms the viewer’s concerns and assumptions about a France overwhelmed by these flows of migrants hard to control.