A Prophet

With films like “Inglorious Basterds” and “The White Ribbon,” the 2009 Cannes Film Festival provided a historical, if anatomical, lesson on human violence. The festival’s Grand Prix winner, “A Prophet,” could perhaps serve as the keynote example for such a lecture.

Directed by Jacques Audiard (“The Beat That My Heart Skipped”), the film follows the six-year sentence of a young, French-Arab man forced to navigate the hierarchy of a jail in present-day France. Though this scenario is seemingly ripe for political commentary, especially given the French government’s recent controversies with Arab immigrants, the only politics present in the film are those of the frightening world of prison. It strays from the spiritualizing of “Shawshank Redemption” while managing to go far beyond the ruthlessness of “Oz,” thus capturing an accurate, typically unseen portrait of a real-life prison.

Because the protagonist, Malik El Djebena (Tahar Rahim), enters the prison at the age of nineteen after dropping out of school at eleven, the film isn’t as much a gangster picture as it is a bildungsroman. He doesn’t just learn how to kill people, or how to build a drug empire from the inside; El Djebena also learns how to read and write. Through his brief encounters on the outside, he also discovers what there is to live for in the real world.

It is often a convention of film for the newly freed inmate to lead a charmed, rags-to-riches life, though in “A Prophet” the story is of leading a charmed life on the inside. What makes this aspect of the film so good is Rahim’s terrified performance in the lead. Though confident, calculating, and ultimately successful, there are very few moments in the film in which the audience truly believes that he knows what he is doing. Perhaps for some intended parity, there is even a literal deer-in-headlights featured in the film. His incredible performance is highlighted by the fact that it is essentially his acting debut—given that his first acting role in 2006 was as a “Taliban Interrogator” in the straight-to-DVD film “The 9/11 Commission Report.”

Audiard is an expert at using this trait of Rahim’s character early in the film to capture the empathy, if not sympathy, of the audience. As El Djebena prepares for his first hit to gain protection from the Corsicans, he sits in front of a mirror trying to teach himself how to hide a razorblade in the side of his mouth, and his gums begin to bleed. The look of agonizing determination in Rahim’s face at this and many moments in the film evoke a documentary authenticity. The typically circuitous plot twists of a crime narrative seem somehow that much more manageable because Rahim appears equally confused by them.

What makes “A Prophet” a truly great film, though, is its irreverence, which often crosses into pure magical realism. Characters and scenes are introduced with bold-lettered captions, and the incredible soundtrack has everything from Bob Dylan-sound-a-likes to Nas. The “Prophet” of the title is also intended literally—El Djebena is haunted by his first hit, a fellow Arab, who gives him visions of the future, teaches him about Islam, and smokes with him through his neck wound. It’s as if Murakami turned the second half of Camus’ “The Stranger” inside-out.

The only complaint that can be made is simply that the film is,  at two and a half hours, too long. At the same time though, nearly every moment is so fascinating and suspenseful that one doesn’t think too much about the time. To the credit of Audiard, it seems as though he truly did need 150 minutes to develop his complex plot and characters. The level of detail in the film almost necessitates a second viewing—if for no other reason than to better appreciate Niels Arestrup’s performance as the Corsican mob boss.

When Rahim’s character goes through lockdown in the prison, he must stick out his tongue to show he isn’t hiding a razorblade, and when he goes through airport security at one point in the film, he instinctively sticks out his tongue—and that level of detail is what makes this movie nearly-perfect. Quentin Tarantino and James Cameron alike should be thankful that “A Prophet” is only competing for Best Foreign at the Oscars.

—Staff writer Andrew F. Nunnelly can be reached at nunnelly@fas.harvard.edu.