Jacques Audiard has built a career of some repute over the past ten years or so. Both READ MY LIPS and THE BEAT THAT MY HEART SKIPPED were critically acclaimed and small commercial successes. A PROPHET is, without doubt, the crowning achievement of his career.
A crime epic, A PROPHET is scintillating cinema. The story of a young Muslim’s transition from nervous new inmate, to mafia boss in a French prison, this is thrilling, thoughtful and powerful stuff from the first frame to the last.
It’s an inventively directed film, to boot. Audiard plays with the conventions of the prison movie, in the process making A PROPHET the best prison movie in living memory, and possibly, of all. It also isn’t dwarfed by comparisons to some of the great crime movies.
As Malik, Tahar Rahim gives an astounding performance. It’s full of menace and poise. He plays Malik as a man constantly learning from and adapting to his surroundings. This is most commonly essayed by the scenes in which Malik is visited by his first murder victim’s ghost. He’s unable to let it go, and in accepting the guilt and pain he becomes stronger and more prepared to do what it takes to escape from his current situation (if not his prison).
2009 wasn’t a great year for film, but 2010 is shaping up to be much better, with this and STILL WALKING released in the last two weeks, PRECIOUS: BASED ON THE NOVEL PUSH BY SAPPHIRE out next week and THE CITY OF LIFE AND DEATH (maybe the best film I’ve seen in three years) released in April. Great cinema is happening now, and I heartily recommend that you use A PROPHET as the starting point.
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