Metaphors often work for their ability to succinctly capture and elucidate a complex idea, employing more accessible terminology and concepts than their perhaps obscure counterparts for which they stand. Too stretch a metaphor to its logical conclusion might come across as tedious or, worse, a dead horse beating contest. The inquisitive conceit of Cold Souls is a rather simple one, yet it has far-reaching applications: what is the soul? Is the soul a physical entity? Is the soul itself a metaphor? Sophie Barthes asks these questions as she writes and directs this film, and in so doing, leaves few stones unturned. Witty, charming, and, above all, enlightening, Cold Souls is a film that asks hard questions with a smirk hiding in the corner of its mouth.

Paul Giamatti (Paul Giamatti) plays himself as himself. During rehearsals for Chekhov’s play Uncle Vanya, he finds that he can’t quite separate himself from the character, and he feels his life sinking further into a mire of hopelessness. To alleviate his pain, his agent recommends he consider having his soul removed. And he’s serious, too. So, taking his advice, Paul played by Paul as Paul goes to the Soul Storage Company to investigate this new technological wonder. After deciding to go through with it, he finds himself worse off than before. He returns to get his soul back – but there’s a problem: his soul has been stolen. And, with one of the best lines of the entire film, the contrived, thinly disguised plot really gets going: “What is my soul doing in Russia?!”

Giamatti, ironically enough, turns in what may be his best performance to date. His simplicity and honesty rival anything he’s accomplished heretofore. His character (himself) is an actor at odds with himself, and Giamatti brilliantly plays the role of a lifetime, what Camus called the role each person must play, what Stanislavski referred to as the most interesting thing in the world: himself. Emily Watson plays his wife (Red Dragon; Synecdoche, New York), a woman unable to understand fully her husband’s trauma, even after he reveals the truth. Ultimately, this story is a tale of questions, at turns tearfully inspired and guffaw-inducing funny, as Giamatti captures the essence of a man truly grappling with his own soul in a palpable, moving performance.

Like many teachers, this film never truly answers the questions that it asks. In fact, at times, it admits openly that it doesn’t know the answers. What happens to the soul after death? The doctor (played by David Strathairn) states unequivocally that he has absolutely no idea. What is the essence of a human being? Ultimately, what separates us from the rest of the animal kingdom? And, simply, who are we? These questions are ubiquitous, finding manifestations throughout every culture since we hopped up on our hind legs. A genuine, droll, and affecting film, Cold Souls explores these age-old inquiries with aplomb and poignance, under a new light, both literally and emblematic of something much larger than itself. And, in the end, we learn that, with all its deformities and imperfections, our soul, this unbearable lightness, is truly what makes life worth living.

Rating: 3.5/4 Stars

The Coen Brothers are a truly dynamic duo. Wielding wit, charisma, and an invigorating spirit, they deftly create films in which the story often unfolds both dramatically and comically, revealing the dual nature of existence. A Serious Man tells the tragically comic story of Larry Gopnik, a professor whose life, at times both enviable and its opposite, quickly takes several turns for the worse. Joel and Ethan Coen take Larry’s life and unveil the horror lying just beneath the surface.

Larry Gopnik is Jewish, married (kind of), with a handful of rebellious teenaged kids, and he teaches physics at a nearby college. Even his subject of expertise is fraught with varying levels of uncertainty. Larry soon feels as if he has no idea what to do with his life, as his wife leaves him, his son who is supposed to be preparing for Bar Mitzvah makes purchases behind his back, and his Jewish faith is a shambles. Seeking the guidance of Jewish rabbis of increasing levels of rank, he attempts to reconcile the chaos of crisis with the constancy of his religious beliefs. The answers he receives are intentionally vague, seemingly leaving something unsaid, and to him, certainly not very helpful. He even resorts to asking his lawyer for help in what turns into a kind of therapy session – to no avail. The unknown surrounds Larry. In the end, he is forced to come face to face to with simply not having all the answers. Much easier said than done, of course.

Shot as a horror film, the Coens manage to delve deeper and deeper into the psychological horror of Larry’s all-too-normal life. Because he’s Jewish and his life seems rough, it may at times it seem like a page out of the Biblical story of Job, but A Serious Man isn’t about coming full circle. It isn’t about getting everything back that he once lost. Larry loses his grip on reality. His problems are quite normal in many respects, and, ultimately, nothing too special. His wife wants a divorce; his teenagers are healthy and stubborn; his job is secure. He hasn’t lost many things, but he has lost a sense of purpose. He’s lost the stability of stasis. He feels like he’s losing his mind. Larry may get his grip back, but Job lost every familial and material possession he had. Larry has lost a guiding sense of meaning, which more or less ebbs and flows throughout life. We feel secure, then lost, then confused, then stable. Sometimes we don’t know what we feel.

So, in some ways, this film resembles Job’s, but this isn’t a Biblical allegory. To think so would be to miss the point of the film entirely. Each person’s life is a horror story lingering below the veil of reality, and when it rises to the surface we feel the panic of uncertainty, what Camus called coming face to face with the absurdity of existence. When this happens, all feels lost, all seems to be in ruins, though that may not actually be the case. It might. But it might not.

The Coens are brilliant filmmakers. With wonderful casting and a number of fantastic performances from Michael Stuhlbarg (as Larry) and Richard Kind (as his brother), they create a horrifying cinematic experience, in which things aren’t as they seem, and certainty is just out of arm’s reach. At turns both dismal and absurd, this film takes its spot near the top of the Coen Canon, and certainly one of the best films of the year – if not the decade.

Rating: 4/4 Stars

Before anybody became somebody, they were practically a nobody. That’s the understanding, anyway, and Coco Before Chanel is an extended case-in-point. However, if it exemplifies the previous adage, it also stands testament to the power of two things, unrelated but connected: benefactors and femininity. Though “everyone must start somewhere,” it helps to have someone eventually give you money, and it may expedite that process if one is an attractive woman. This film illuminates both with grace and subtlety.

The young Gabrielle, or “Coco,” played expertly by Audrey Tautou (The Da Vinci Code), works as a seamstress. Earlier still, she lived in an orphanage. At night, Coco and her sister perform and sing at clubs. She catches the eye of a wealthy aristocrat, Étienne Balsan, a man who attempts to give her a shot at a bigger spotlight. Soon, however, he leaves for his large “castle” in the country. Coco, who is now seemingly destitute without her older sister, travels to his home and requests to stay on for a while. “A while” evolves into days, and, eventually, days into years. Creating a strong but odd relationship, Coco and Balsan seem to live happily. When Arthur ‘Boy’ Capel shows up, however, things change, and Coco’s life, as so often seems to be the case with her, will never be the same.

One might guess that a woman who would eventually become the famous “Chanel” would be a tireless worker, an indefatigable individual with an indomitable spirit, working until the job is done, trying harder and harder to achieve her dreams. According to this particular film, that is not quite the case. Anne Fontaine, the writer/director, crafts a story  that seems to depict Coco as a stubborn, at times impetuous, and all around lazy individual. She desires nothing more than “to work,” but it seems only to rid herself of the social constructions of a male dominated society, not because she is such an ideal “hard worker.” On the contrary, she customarily refuses to entertain guests, leaves her suitors and benefactors, and even declines to act in a socially acceptable manner at times.

All this being known, she still succeeded. She was a chic, quirky spirit, whose talent could not be hidden, and Tautou is brilliant, playing her with simplicity, poise, and elegance. The acting is good on all accounts, and the writing (not to mention the beautiful costumes, for which it received an Oscar nomination) complements it well. Fontaine seems to direct with great confidence, gently allowing the story to unfold, slowly but surely, as we grow with Coco, think with her, and aspire with her to autonomy, importance, and celebrity.

Ultimately, we know the ending. Many times, true stories or “Based on a True Story” stories aren’t about the ending so much as they are about the journey, the process, the path taken by a seemingly ordinary person destined for greatness. Coco Before Chanel takes the most famous name in all of fashion, Chanel, and returns to its roots, from the orphanage to the castle, from the castle to the limelight. From here, Chanel, a lowly orphan with an incredible gift, became the Queen of Fashion. This film portrays her lucidly and effectively. Even if you couldn’t care less about the world of fashion, this film, like The Devil Wears Prada, is almost certainly worth it.

Rating: 3.5/4 Stars

It’s said that the worst possible trauma a parent can experience is outliving their children, and, therefore, burying them, mourning their loss, and living out the rest of their lives with a gaping emotional wound, wrapped with new tourniquets each day, never completely healing, never fully returning to that approximation of wholeness towards which we strive. Stasis is broken, and the psychological anguish never quite subsides, like a vengeful tide bent on wreaking havoc on the unsuspecting shore. This film tells this story, replete with all the vulnerability and instability that such trauma leaves behind it. More or less one film split into two hour-long segments, Antichrist succeeds in spades for the initial half, then unfortunately devolves into a series of painful sadomasochism.

A couple loses their child while they make love (in the first of several truly pornographic sex scenes). In the midst of an orgasmic experience, their toddler son makes a fateful descent, ending whatever semblance of normalcy that may have existed for this disturbing couple. Willem Defoe plays the husband, a therapist who turns his work on his wife (played unsettlingly well by Charlotte Gainsbourg), a woman struggling with the loss of her son and, essentially, her own sanity. This story is constructed in successive chapters, each taking its name from successive levels of grief coping mechanisms. By the close of the credits, as a fox says during the film (oddly, the only anthropomorphized animal in the film), “Chaos reigns.” At times, it seems, quite literally.

The director, Lars Von Trier, was apparently struggling with bouts of severe depression during the creation of this film, and it could not be much more evident. The woman evolves from a seemingly normal individual coping with the loss of her son into a sadomasochistic being, like Jekyll permanently becoming Hyde. Von Trier creates a surreal, subtle world in which these two (and only two) characters swim through the sea of grief that has swallowed their lives. With hints of expressionism, he forms a fairly brilliant series of scenes with pitch-perfect dialogue. During the first half.

The second half of the film continues the trend of the preceding hour momentarily, before running as far from subtlety as possible, in a sequence of events that are as painfully unnatural as they are unnaturally painful, a convoluted cycle of torment and mutilation. Though almost certainly intentional, this retreat from subtlety and nuance is also a retreat from the art created in the first hour of the film, ending in blatant exhibitionism, a form of psychological and emotional public masturbation.

If the film had maintained the coherence and form of the first half, Von Trier would have created one of the best films of the year, a psychological film, with equal parts tragedy, thriller, and expressionism. Unfortunately, he takes a tragic story with fantastic performances and wonderful cinematography and twists it into an indulgent example of performance art gone horribly wrong. The excellent first half is the only aspect that makes this film worth watching; after that, it’s best to turn it off and leave the film at its best. A kind of tragedy in and of itself.

Rating: 3/4 Stars

Horrors occur all around the globe, under varying levels of spotlight beams. Some, however, deserve (to use the term pejoratively) much more exposure than they have ever received previously. One such macabre violation of dignity is the dolphin genocide taking place in Taijii, Japan, where a group sanctioned by the government is herding, trapping, and killing hundreds of dolphins every day of the year under a veil of secrecy. Led by Richard O’Barry, who trained the original Flipper dolphins, a group resembling Oceans 11 in many ways (a fact not lost on the key players in this film) takes high-tech equipment into Taijii in order to document the atrocities.

O’Barry, a lifelong dolphin lover, was actually a major participant during the initial attempts to take dolphins into captivity when he joined the crew of Flipper. He trained the dolphins and grew to love them. It is his contention, as well that of a growing number of experts in the field the world over, that dolphins are special among non-human animals for one very important reason: they are conscious. All animals have some form of consciousness, sure, but these people maintain that dolphins are conscious in a way akin to humans: more specifically, they are self-conscious. They have a sense of self, a complex emotional life, and are highly intelligent creatures. Because of this, O’Barry and others have made it their life’s goal to pursue the end of dolphin captivity and genocide.

Consciousness is an elusive concept. Self-consciousness is fairly simple to understand from the first-person point of view, but to discern whether another being is self-conscious has posed philosophical problems for a long time. For fear of solipsism, we assume that all (or at least the vast majority) of us, human beings, are conscious - and self-conscious – beings. It goes without saying that to discern whether a non-human animal is actually self-conscious might be a tricky conundrum.

One such self-consciousness “testing” method used is quite simple, really: a mirror. If, when faced with a large mirror, a given entity shows signs that they understand that the image being shown to them is, in fact, them and not another entity, then there seems to be some certainty that the entity in question is self-conscious to a certain extent. Dolphins, when put to this “test,” reveal that they are quite aware that is their image being shown back to them. O’Barry is certain, in fact, that when watching herself on TV, one of the dolphins who played Flipper was very much aware that it was herself on the screen, not another dolphin; moreover, when another dolphin was on the TV, O’Barry says he is certain she knew that too.

The Cove is a fascinating and adventurous documentary look at the world of sea life generally and dolphins (and whales) in particular. Specifically, is it wrong to kill a self-conscious creature, if that creature is non-human? We certainly think it immoral to kill another human, and we have a word for it: murder. When it’s an animal, we say it was “killed,” but rarely, if ever, do we refer to a “murdered animal.” It is this rather simple juxtaposition of the words “kill” and “murder” that elucidates the whole premise of this film. When does self-consciousness begin? Furthermore, if self-consciousness is present in non-human animals, are we ethically obligated not to kill those animals without due cause? Would that be murder?

The film seems to conclude fairly unequivocally that killing dolphins is, indeed, wrong. Whether you agree or not, there’s another, much easier, conclusion that the film makes as well: certainly you cannot watch the massacre of hundreds of dolphins on their secret footage without feeling that some form of ethical violation is taking place, something that must be stopped, regardless of your position on non-human animal consciousness.

Are there “more important” international goals to pursue? That, of course, depends on who you are. And for people like Richard O’Barry, there is little more important in life than pursuing what you feel to be your calling. It is his calling, and he pleads with the viewer as well, to save dolphins from the butchery inflicted on them year round. The fate of dolphins everywhere rests on his decision, and he is urging the viewer to take part.

Rating: 3.5/4 Stars

Alice Sebold wrote a gripping, affecting novel about a young girl whose life is ended far too soon by a man with a devastating and interminable itch: he rapes and murders young girls. Peter Jackson, whose extensive resume includes the epic Lord of the Rings trilogy, is an adept director, a man with visions of legendary proportions, a film artist who pulls out all the stops. This is why it’s so difficult to fathom how and why The Lovely Bones is such a poor, disappointing film.

A young girl, Susie Salmon (Saoirse Ronan),”like the fish,” is on her way home from school when George Harvey (Stanley Tucci) cunningly intercepts her and proceeds to both rape and murder her. Her parents, Abigal and Jack (played respectively by Rachel Weisz and Mark Wahlberg), begin the grueling process of both looking for her and grieving her loss. Susie, meanwhile, is discovering her own new place in the world. Or, rather, in another world altogether: the place in between heaven and earth. Jack and Abigail deal with her death very differently; Abigail eventually leaves the family, while Jack tirelessly searches out her killer. The emotional trauma devastates the family, which would be entirely dismal if it weren’t for the comic relief of Abigail’s mother (Susan Sarandon).

Jackson attempts to tell the story by creating different worlds for each of the major players. A worthy goal that is very poorly executed. The world of Jack is by far the most well told, as we are thrust into the world of a father whose undying love (played actually quite well by Wahlberg) won’t let his daughter’s memory go gently away into that good night. The mother’s story is essentially given the montage treatment, and, concomitantly, she is all but forgotten. Harvey’s story is fashioned fairly well, but it has the distinct feel of a low-budget crime scene reenactment at times, devolving, for a second here and there, into an almost comical presentation of the wretched and plagued man that he is. However, that being said, the rape scene is actually very well done, tasteful and minimalistic.

Lastly, the heaven (or the “in-between place”) scenes are horrendous. One would expect nothing but the most incredible, dazzling CG and special effects from the director of the Lord of the Rings films, but these scenes are nothing but laughable. We want to care strongly for Susie, as she deals with the constant thought of her family, of their attempt to come to grips with her loss in their personal ways, and of her own journey to the other side. Unfortunately, we cannot. Some of the special effects seem to come straight out of an earlier era, reminiscent of a time when we forgave much of what we saw in terms of verisimilitude, because we knew that they were trying their hardest, and the technology just wasn’t quite there yet. In all honesty, the computer graphics from Ghostbusters looks better than this film. At times, much better.

Fortunately, the acting is pretty good all across the board; Tucci, in particular, is extremely good. He seems like any man we might meet next door, though he’s struggling with a wretched urge. Ronan is actually pretty good despite the absurd green screen treatment. And Sarandon is quite possibly one of the film’s better halves (if you will) – in fact, if it weren’t for the acting, this film would be utterly abysmal. All in all, the writing isn’t horrible, but it’s overshadowed so strongly by the poor directing and graphics choices that it’s barely noticeable (surprising when you consider that Fran Walsh and Jackson worked together on all three Lord of the Rings).

Ultimately, this is yet another poignant, moving story poorly told. The tragic reality of the story, of course, is that this happens all the time – girls are abducted and abused, sometimes never to be seen again by their families or the light of day, and the lives of all involved are forever altered. This comes through despite the film’s gross incompetence (a testament to Sebold, in my opinion). In the end, this film is, sadly, not worth watching. There are some very suspenseful moments and a few touching scenes, but, overall, this film fails in so many ways that it becomes an effort not to walk out of the theatre, get your money back, walk to the nearest book store, and buy the novel, in an effort to hear the story told well. Save your time and money. Or, rather, spend it on the book.

Rating: 2/4 Stars

A film set in the 30’s in France, Faubourg 36, or Paris 36, feels like a film actually made in the 30’s. The costumes and the outdoor sets have a contrived artificiality to them, the whole town seems within arm’s reach, and the quality of the shots are more often than not reassuringly melodramatic, in a way we’ve come to love, reminiscent of Casablanca, of a bygone era. The whole film has an endearing quality, with plenty of highs and lows, only enhanced by being a kind of musical (though it never really feels too much like one). Great songs (one receiving an Oscar nomination), nice voices, a very likable cast, and an enjoyable story make this one a success.

In 1936, the Chansonia, a theatre in Parisian district goes under (“faubourg” means “suburb” in French). All jobs are lost: the cast, the crew, everyone involved. A shrewd, dictatorial businessman, Galapiat takes over, and the theatre is shut down. As claims of Fascism and threats of strikes hit the airwaves and the streets, one man, Pigoil, decides to lead the old clan in taking back the Chansonia, leading them on an unending quest to restore themselves and the theatre to greatness.

Pigoil is quick-tempered, impetuous, selfish, and mostly very ignorant. His only redeeming qualities are his best: he’s sincere, and he means well. When Douce shows up, the theatre has found its savior. At least temporarily. Through a series of events, Pigoil, Milous, Jacky, and the rest have their work cut out for them, if they want to get the theatre, and their lives, back on track.

Christophe Barratier directs this musical film, and he does so with aplomb. He seems to attempt to recreate the quality of the Hollywood melodramas from the Golden Age: larger than life personalities, smoking in profile on rooftops, the Eiffel Tower in the distance, and all while confessing ones love to the new girl in town, only to be followed up by a song and dance number. It may sound overly sentimental or even kitschy, but Barratier seems fully aware of what he’s doing at all times, and as a result, the film is truly delightful.

Taking the black and whites from classic Hollywood as its starting (and continual reference) point, Paris 36 ultimately succeeds by creating a cast of charming characters whose lives have taken a turn for the worse. The winsome world of the characters is set against the backdrop of a volatile political environment, adding to the tension of the characters constant frustrations. In the end, we have a feeling for what might happen, but we don’t exactly know how we’ll get there, and in this one, style is really what it’s all about.

Rating: 3.5/4 Stars

A blend of politics, the Mafia, and concentrated, modern, aristocratic Italian culture, Il Divo is a biopic on Giulio Andreotti, seven time Prime Minister of Italy, whose life is shrouded in secrecy and ambiguity, with plenty of wit to boot. Paolo Sorrentino writes and directs this calculated and highly entertaining film, a product of keen foresight and a scrutinizing awareness of each and every detail.

The story, based on Andreotti’s life, is a fascinating account of one powerful man’s unwavering commitment to secrecy, an obsessive-compulsive lifestyle in which everything is the product of extraordinary premeditation and an uncannily phlegmatic demeanor. A series of imprecise events contribute to the dissolution of Andreotti’s core group of followers, until all is apparently lost. The Italian government accuses Andreotti of Mafia involement, something against which he must adamantly defend himself, and, in the end, his eternal self-reliance will either be his savior or his hamartia.

Toni Servillo plays Andreotti serenely, brilliantly portraying a man whose outward character seems like the unsettling fusion of Kim Jong-Il and Mr. Magoo. Servillo’s surreal stillness is captivating. He says nothing, yet we hang on his every movement, his breathing, his pupils, his meticulous hands. And he is surrounded by capable actors and actresses, a cast of political players whose goal is nothing more than the deification, or downfall, of Andreotti.

The cinematography alone is reason enough to see this film. Sorrentino crafts each scene, however long, with conscientiousness and committed intentionality, not to mention a mordant wit, as dry as it is wry. He presents characters (and subtitles) from unforeseen angles, hidden behind objects, or not at all, all working to further the intangible quality of this film and its characters, whose larger-than-life personalities seemingly jump off the screen.

Andreotti, Il Divo himself, was truly a character, and this film certainly seems to do him justice, portraying a volatile and furtive political landscape, where conspiracy lurks around most corners, leaving the others simply too dark to see much of anything at all. Sorrentino and Servillo work well together, adding this to their repertoire of collaborative efforts, including Gomorra and the upcoming This Must Be the Place. Like all great director-actor collaborations, this film leaves one wanting more. If nothing else, at least a second viewing.

Rating: 4/4 Stars

A middle-aged, weathered performer who’s down on his luck, strapped for cash, and reaching for the bottle. Haven’t we seen this before? We have. This film wishes it was The Wrestler from 2008. It can’t be The Wrestler for one very simple reason: it tries way too hard to please everybody. Nothing is that hard to handle, it pulls punches throughout, and each ache is quickly bandaged with laughter or sentimentality. Cooper puts together a pretty decent film, with good writing and straightforward cinematography. Ultimately, though, it’s Jeff Bridges’s performance and several doses of feel-good country music that make this film a mass-market win.

Bad Blake (Bridges) is a country musician who has run his course, riding in on fumes from a career that ended a decade earlier. He drinks like a fish, and his shows suffer for it. While on his armpit of America tour, he meets Jean Craddock (Maggie Gyllenhaal), a single mother who quickly shows she’s more than just another tour junkie looking to get laid. They are smitten, and a romance separated by tour miles and a generation gap buds and attempts to bloom. Following a few missteps, Blake comes face to face with questions he must answer if he wants to live a meaningful life.

Bridges is very good, in touch with his character in a way we have come to expect from silver screen vets. His Blake is everything we expect him to be. He is certainly believable, and he reveals the pathos that has been welling in Blake’s soul for years, but, though it may be one of Bridges’s best and one of the year’s best, if we’re honest, it probably isn’t the best performance that we have seen this year.

Bridges is complemented well by Gyllenhaal, who seems to be channelling Renée Zellweger, circa 1996. However, the floodgates are opened in almost every scene, causing her to lose emotional honesty and the audience to care less about her than we might have had she shown some restraint, some personal character, an attempt to quell the tears which gnaw at her eyes, begging to be set free. Instead, we are coerced into caring, a current running rampant through much of this film.

The music is mostly kitschy, the writing fine but incredibly safe, and the whole story a bit too easy to come by. Cooper’s directorial debut shows much promise, but he needs to find a voice detached from the crowd, something we haven’t seen, or, perhaps more importantly at times, something we don’t want to see. The Wrestler was able to pull this off with dignity and candor. Then again, we are comparing Darren Aronofsky with a first-timer. At least a pinch of lenience is due.

All in all, much could probably be forgiven in this one if the credits had rolled about ten minutes earlier than they do, when we see Blake alone, guitar in hand, singing to himself the song that resulted from his life-changing experiences. Instead, the film rolls on, and everything is wrapped up nicely – with a sunset to boot. Cooper needs to remove the gimmicks and just tell the story. Because he doesn’t do that here, Crazy Heart is ultimately just one more above-average feel-good film that could have been so much more.

Rating: 3/4 Stars

Imagine the Godfather trilogy set almost entirely in a prison in France. You now have a pretty good idea of what to expect from Un prophète, both in substance and tonality. This visceral epic depicts the harsh realities of both prison life and the painful truth of being involved in the mafia, whether within or beyond the prison walls. With no holds barred, Un prophète takes the viewer on the journey of one man’s gripping confrontation with life behind bars and the burdens he must bear simply in order to stay alive.

Jacques Audiard (The Beat That My Heart Skipped) directs this ambitious film about an Arab named Malik El Djebena, who is thrown into prison for six years for something he claims he didn’t do. Six years in this prison is an eternity, one that many may not live to see. Djebena catches the eye of who might as well be the Don Vito Corleone of the prison, the inmate who essentially controls the entire institution, guards and all, whose past remains clouded and whose appearance resembles Brando himself in a way. Through one task after another, the prison eventually grants Djebena days of freedom, twelve hours outside the walls of the prison, during which he begins to make ties of his own, ties which will grant him possibilities he never dreamed of, lending credibility, in one scene, to what seem to be prophetic abilities.

Audiard crafts a brilliant, jarring film, and what might as well be a course in storytelling. Much conventional work is incorporated, but some aspects defy convention, including, at times, some engrossing cinematography. Audiard also collaborated on the script (replete with that beguiling quality so characteristic of the French tongue), and it shows, as the level of control seems evident throughout the film. Should a sequel be in order, one can only hope it resembles the intensity and mastery of this one.

Newcomer Tahar Rahim is Djebena in a riveting performance, and his counterpart, Niels Arestrup, plays the Don, César Luciani, with compelling honesty, in what may be his magnum opus. The casting is spot on all around, and the performances all up to the task. In fact, there are no weak links in the acting chain here, as all the roles are played extremely well.

Raw, unflinching, and powerful, this film is an absorbing encounter, a veritable Godfather for a new generation (a fact of which it is not unaware – at one point, Djebena is told he is the godfather of someone’s newborn son), and an instant classic. One of the best films of the year, it is a triumph, a must see for anyone capable of withstanding the film’s nearly three hours of unadulterated brutality.  A film worthy of recognition, Un prophète deserves to be seen again and again and again.

Rating: 4/4 Stars