Dvd
A Prophet
Critically acclaimed French crime-drama, A Prophet details the prison career of Malik el Djebena (Tahar Rahim), a 19-year-old man of North African origin who learns the ropes of the Cosican mob and becomes a criminal kingpin from within prison walls.
Winner of the Best Foreign Film BAFTA 2010, and nominated for Best Foreign Film Oscar at the 2010 Academy Awards.
Starring Tahar Rahim, Niels Arestrup, Adel Bencherif, Hichem Yacoubi, Reda Kateb, Jean-Philippe Ricci
Directed by Jacques Audiard ('The Beat That My Heart Skipped', 'Read My Lips')
Written by Thomas Bidegain, Jacques Audiard, Abdel Raouf Dafri, Nicolas Peufaillit
Festivals & Awards BAFTA winner for Best Foreign Film, 2010.
World Cinema, Drama, Crime | 2hr 37mins | Rated (R18) | contains violence, offensive language, drug use & sex scenes | Origin: France, Italy | Language: French, Arabic and Corsican | Official Site »
- Trailers
- Reviews
-
- SHARE:
- SHARE:
The Talk
36 votes / No comments
Flicks review
-
5
Moviemakers just love jails – it’s the caged violence, the colourful backstories, the satisfying narrative arc of being caught, incarcerated then released. But while Shawshank remains the most beloved of the genre, A Prophet is by far the most believable – and you’ll find no redemption within these walls.
A tough little punk pretending to be a man, Malik (the brilliantly empathetic Rahim) finds himself in a world of shifting allegiances, leering faces and sudden spurts of violence. It’s a prison of the soul as much as of the body, and Audiard juxtaposes the prosaic (laundry, cards, masturbation) with the dramatic (drugs, beatings, bribes) to evoke the daily drip, drip, drip of boredom intermingling with fear. Only one thing doesn’t ring true: do French prisoners really get their own baguettes every day?
In a brutal way, it’s quite beautiful, with bleached sunlight puncturing the endless institutional grey. It’s also terrifying – literally kill or be killed. Like a young Michael Corleone, Malik plays the Arabs off against the Corsican mob of Cesar Luciani (Arestup), a bulldog of a man with homicidal levels of self-belief. But Malik’s a perpetual outsider straddling two warring worlds, and there’s no telling who might be heading towards his cell to scheme with – or suffocate – him next.
Like Goodfellas without the visual fizz, or Scarface played straight, this is, quite simply, one of the greatest prison films ever made. An unforgettable early sequence sees Malik concealing a razor blade in his mouth. Throughout Audiard’s tough, tense, and immersive opus you’ll know exactly how he feels.
SHARE:
The people's reviews
3 reviews
Press Reviews
-
Chicago Sun-Times (Roger Ebert)
The best performance in the film is by Arestrup as Cesar. You may remember him from Audiard's "The Beat That My Heart Skipped" (2005), where he played a seedy but confident father who psychically overshadows his son.
Read full review -
Christchurch Press (James Croot)
A searing and stunning look at life behind bars.
Read full review -
Empire (UK)
4
A modern French crime epic where the smudges and crossings out do not diminish the passages of great dreamlike power.
Read full review -
Hollywood Reporter
What's most immediately remarkable about the film is the raw intensity of its hyper-realistic encounters, hugely enhanced by the superb acting of newcomer Rahim.
Read full review -
Los Angeles Times
To borrow a marketing phrase from another, very different film, A Prophet really is the movie that reminds you why you love the movies. Especially movies like this one.
Read full review -
New York Times
One of those rare films in which the moral stakes are as insistent and thought through as the aesthetic choices.
Read full review -
View Auckland (Matt Turner)
5
With its gripping story of a low-level thug rising through the criminal ranks, A Prophet frequently resembles a sort of French prison version of Goodfellas. The comparisons are extremely apt, because this is as much a gangster thriller as a prison drama and as such, it's worthy of a place alongside the established classics.
Read full review
View more trailers close window
-
Loading the player ...
Search For a DVD
I beg your pardon?
- Flicks.co.nz is serving the great nation of NZ with all things cinematic. Question about a movie or cinema? Thoughts on the site? Quips, gripes, advice for our own personal self-development?
- Get in touch with us by email at ED@ FLICKS.CO.NZ,on TWITTER oron FACEBOOK.
Want to see it
What say you? Yes No
Be the first to comment!