A Prophet

A Prophet is the third foreign film nominee (for this year) that I have seen. And despite almost unanimous raves I have to say that it is the one that I liked the least.

Directed by Jacques Audiard the film is about a young man named Malik (Tahir Rahim) who has been in various juvenile detention centers. Now that he has become of age he is sent to a regular prison. He is an Arab so right away there are problems. He is approached by Luciani (Niels Arestrop) and his gang of thugs. He is to kill another Muslim and he does not do so Luciani will kill him. Well, you can guess what his decision is.

The rest of the film shows how Malik deals with prison life and how he eventually goes to the top of his game. The film is very rough and very violent but that is how a prison film would be.

I thought that the film was well directed. Audiard captured the essence of prison life in a very realistic way. Rahim is terrific as Malik and and he is truly an actor to watch. And Arestrop is unbelievable as the wicked Luciani. All of the other actors were very good as well. However, the script written by Audiard and Thomas Bidegain does not bring anything new to the film. We have seen all of this before. And while the film is never boring it could have been a little shorter (it is two and a half hours).

I do recommend this film to people who want to see all of the Oscar nominees and who also want to support foreign language film (these days foreign films need all the support that they can get). But it is not as good as Ajami and certainly not as good as The White Ribbon (which I thought was outstanding). I haven't seen the Oscar winner The Secret of Their Eyes but I will in May and I am certainly looking forward to it.