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A Prophet

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A Prophet
File:AProphet poster.jpg
French-language poster
Directed byJacques Audiard
Written byJacques Audiard
Thomas Bidegain
Abdel Raouf Dafri
Nicolas Peufaillit
Produced byMartine Cassinelli
Antonin Dedet
StarringTahar Rahim
Niels Arestrup
Adel Bencherif
CinematographyStéphane Fontaine
Edited byJuliette Welfling
Music byAlexandre Desplat
Distributed byInternational:
Celluloid Dreams
France:
UGC Distribution
United States:
Sony Pictures Classics
Release dates
France:
16 May 2009 (2009-05-16)
(Cannes)
United States:
12 February 2010 (2010-02-12)
Running time
150 minutes
CountryTemplate:Film France
LanguagesFrench
Corsican
Arabic
Budget€ 12 million
Box office€ 15,779,122

A Prophet (French: Un prophète) is a 2009 French crime/drama/thriller film directed by Jacques Audiard. Audiard claims that the film aims at "creating icons, images for people who don't have images in movies, like the Arabs in France,"[1] though he also had stated that the film "has nothing to do with his vision of society," and is a work of fiction.[2]

The film was a nominee for Best Foreign Language Film at the 82nd Academy Awards, in 2010. It lost to the Argentine crime drama, The Secret in Their Eyes (El secreto de sus ojos).

Plot

Sentenced to six years in prison, petty criminal Malik El Djebena (Tahar Rahim), nineteen years old, French of Arab descent, is alone in the world and illiterate. On his arrival at prison, he quickly falls under the sway of a brutal Corsican mafia group, led by Cesar Luciani, who enforce their rule in the prison. To survive, Malik must toughen himself and win the confidence of the Corsican group. Almost immediately, Luciani forces him to kill a rat Arab prisoner named Reyeb. Satisfied with Malik's obedience, Luciani arranges Malik's acceptance into a prison leave program so that Malik can do important errands for him on the outside, including murder. The film follows Malik who, during his sentence, receives a very special education and uses what he's learned to discreetly develop his own powerful network.

Cast

Production

The film's screenplay, re-worked by Jacques Audiard and Thomas Bidegain, was submitted to them by a producer, though the idea of making a film set in prison first came to Audiard after he had a film screened in a prison and was shocked by the conditions there.[2][3]

Audiard cast Niels Arestrup, featured in Audiard's previous, highly acclaimed, film, ["The Beat that My Heart Skipped,"] as the Corsican crime boss César Luciani, and met Tahar Rahim, who plays Malik, when they shared an automobile ride from another film set. To ensure the authenticity of the prison experience, Audiard hired former convicts as advisors and extras.[3]

Reception

The film has received overwhelmingly positive reviews and currently holds a 97% 'Fresh' rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 129 reviews.[4]

Director Jacques Audiard (center) and stars Niels Arestrup and Tahar Rahim at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival.

Reception of the film after its debut screening at 2009 Cannes Film Festival at the competition was good. A Prophet was picked as the best film of the festival by a group of sixteen English language critics and bloggers polled by the daily independent film news site indieWIRE.[5]

Karin Badt at The Huffington Post called it "refreshingly free".[2] Jonathan Romney of Screen International said that the film "works both as hard-edged, painstaking detailed social realism and as a compelling genre entertainment."[6]

Luke Davies of The Monthly criticized some of the film's stylistic methodology and content, asserting that the prophetic themes could have been stretched out, but he celebrated the film's central character and his well-executed "improbable rise from invisibility to dominance", describing "what gives [the film] such dynamic energy is the seamlessness with which this transition unfolds". Davies described the film's main achievement as conveying a character "someone we care about and gun for" who started life on screen as a blank slate.[7]

Awards

The film was the submission of France for the 82nd Academy Awards for Best Foreign Film.[8] On February 2, 2010, when Academy Award nominations were announced, A Prophet received a nomination for Best Foreign Language film. The other four films in the category were Ajami, The Milk of Sorrow and The White Ribbon, and the eventual winner, El secreto de sus ojos.[9]

A Prophet won the Grand Prix at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival.[10] At the 53rd London Film Festival, it won the Best Film Award.[11][12] It won the Prix Louis Delluc 2009.[13] At the 63rd British Academy Film Awards, it won a BAFTA for Best Film Not in the English Language. It was nominated for 13 César Awards, tying it with three other films for the most nominations of any film in César history. It won 9 Cesars at the ceremony, including Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor.[14]

In 2010 Empire magazine ranked it at number 63 in its "The 100 Best Films Of World Cinema" list.[15]

References

  1. ^ "Nous voulions fabriquer des héros à partir de figures que l’on ne connaît pas, qui n’ont pas de représentation iconique au cinéma, comme les Arabes par exemple." "Entretien avec Jacques Audiard, réalisateur d'Un prophète". Dossier de presse (in French). Cinemotions. Retrieved March 8, 2010.
  2. ^ a b c Badt, Karin (May 18, 2009). "Cannes Favorite: Jacques Audiard's "The Prophet"". The Huffington Post. Retrieved August 21, 2009. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  3. ^ a b Turan, Kenneth (May 19, 2009). "Jacques Audiard's 'A Prophet' has a buzz building". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved August 21, 2009.
  4. ^ "A Prophet". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved 2010-21-02. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  5. ^ "Audiard's "Prophet" Hailed by Critics, Bloggers as Best of Cannes". indiewire. May 27, 2009. Retrieved August 21, 2009. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  6. ^ Romney, Jonathan (May 25, 2009). "A Prophet (Un Prophète)". screendaily.com. Retrieved August 21, 2009. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  7. ^ Davies, Luke (February 2010). "Lost Boys: Jacques Audiard's A Prophet and John Hillcoat's The Road". The Monthly.
  8. ^ Le Figaro.Fr
  9. ^ "CNN".
  10. ^ "Festival de Cannes: A Prophet". festival-cannes.com. Retrieved May 9, 2009.
  11. ^ "Winner of Best Film Award: A Prophet". bfi.org. Retrieved October 30, 2009.
  12. ^ "French film receives London award". bbc.co.uk. October 29, 2009. Retrieved October 30, 2009.
  13. ^ "Prix Louis Delluc : «Un prophète» sacré meilleur film 2009" (in French). Le Parisien. December 11, 2009. Retrieved December 11, 2009.
  14. ^ "2010 César Winners". César Awards. Retrieved 2010-25-03. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  15. ^ "The 100 Best Films Of World Cinema". Empire. {{cite web}}: Text "63. A Prophet" ignored (help)
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