
A Prophet (Un Prophete) (FR) Directed by Jacques Audiard Written by Jacques Audiard; Thomas Bidgeain; Abdel Raouf Dafri; Nicolas Peufaillit Starring Tahar Rahim; Niels Arestrup; Adel Bencherif; Hichem Yacoubi; Reda Kaleb; Jean-Phillipe Ricci; Leila Behkti; Slimane Dazi
Fifty eight year old Frenchman Jacques Audiard brings us his fifth film, a violent prison/crime drama about a nineteen year old of North African descent, Malik El Djebena (Tahar Rahim), and his desperate efforts to survive a six year sentence. Audiard’s previous film, The Beat That My Heart Skipped (2005) established the director as having legitimate claim to the long held throne of the great French master of criminal cool, Jean-Pierre Melville. A Prophet also arises in the tradition of classic French prison dramas like Jacques Becker’s Le Trou and Robert Bresson’s A Man Escaped. Comparisons have been offered too to Coppola’s Godfather and De Palma’s Scarface, but Audiard’s film accomplishes its ultimately epic feel in a telling that is far less sweeping than these well-known crime sagas.
The Beat That My Heart Skipped was a re-imagining of James Toback’s Fingers, starring Harvey Keitel. Audiard is clearly influenced by American films of the type, though, as he has stated, his latest work bears more than a passing resemblance to recent European entries like Nicolas Winding Refn’s Pusher Trilogy and the Italian made Gomorrah. Unlike the latter, however, Audiard manages to successfully walk a precarious line, evoking the kind of gritty minimalism employed by fellow French language filmmakers The Dardenne Brothers, while simulaneously juggling an intricate plot and a host of characters. While Gomorrah eventually teeters with the excess of too many brilliantly rendered but disparate elements, Audiard keeps his directorial clutches firmly around the potentially unwieldy plot as his story expands.
Recent prison stories such as Bronson (directed by Refn) and Hunger (by Brit Steve MacQueen) were highly stylized meta commentaries that utilized artful photography, including changes in motion and speed, and various other devices, in their depictions of extreme physical and mental violence and degradation. Audiard is not above stylistic flourishes, and he employs a dead character, Reyeb, who appears to his protagonist in waking and sleeping dreams; adds name titles to assist in identifying new characters; and lays on an eclectic sountrack featuring Nas, Sigor Ros; and Jimmy Gale Gilmore - elements that work towards differentiating his style further from both straight neo-realism and the kind of artful, heightened minimalism employed in a film like Hunger.
Sent away for assaulting a cop (though professing his innocence) and refusing to inform, young Malik quickly learns that simply blending in and keeping to himself will not be an option inside the walls of the hell hole he now calls his home. The prison is ruled with an iron hand by vicious Corsican Mafia leader, senior citizen Cesar Luciani, embodied with authentic animalistic ferocity by Niels Arestrup, the actor who played a shady real estate developer in Audiard’s previous film. Arestrup’s Cesar calls to mind memorable performances by the likes of Lino Ventura; Roger Deschamp; and Jean Gabin, belonging to an elite class of actor posessing the necessary gravitas to pull off a believable portrayal of an aging tough guy.
The relatively inexperienced Rahim too is excellent as the illiterate teen who is coerced into working for the Corsican faction, but later manages to straddle the divide between them and the Muslim stronghold. Though he is, in a way, marooned - derided by both as either a traitor or a “dirty arab”, he is a picture of vigilance, constantly listening, observing, and learning from the hardened killers and schemers around him. We discover little about his background, other than a brief disclosure scene when he reveals that his parents weren’t around, and that he spent time in juvenile facilities. His scarred face and body, however, tell their own explicit tale of a short but brutal life endured.
To his credit, Audiard refuses to beg for our sympathies on Malik’s behalf, letting us determine just how much empathy he merits. In the beginning of the film, Malik is clearly something of a wounded animal, still innocent in many ways, open to victimization. Largely minus a moral compass of his own, filled with fear and motivated by threats, his actions are dictated almost wholey by the sadistic Cesar and whims of the twisted code they all live by. As he grows, however, and begins to make his own decisions, Malik becomes more culpable for his morally compromised decisions, regardless of the limits and nature of his experience.
Where most films would have derailed once the locale shifts to outside the prison, Audiard manages to keep the story tightly on track, avoiding cliche traps at almost every turn. Yes, this is a genre film, but some of the most powerful cinematic achievements in history have been as well. Audiard guides the ship with an assured hand, immersing us in a world that has resonance with the changing face of France itself. The hatred the Corsicans harbor for the prison’s growing Muslim population stands as a microcosm for an open European nation experiencing an ongoing influx of (largely) brown-skinned immigrants, while facing the subsequent challenges the immersion of new cultures pose. In this way, A Prophet recalls Matthieu Kassovitz’ superb crime drama La Haine.
Un Prophete won the Bafta; the Grand Prize at Cannes; is the frontrunner for the Cesar; and was nominated for an Academy award for Best Foreign picture. Excellent hand held visuals from cinematographer Stephane Fontaine contribute to this impressively intense work from one of the more unique and exciting voices in modern cinema.