Director Jacques Audiard‘s latest and greatest crime film, A Prophet (AKA: Un prophète), is a haunting look at one man’s six-year prison sentence as he rises from lapdog to top dog. And this is my type of crime story: no big name actors, shaky-cam action sequences or cliché gangster talk. Just an accurate reflection of this cold, fast-buck world of ours. The French have a rich history of amazing crime films (see: the GOAT, Rififi) and Audiard’s gun has been smoking for over a decade now. His previous crime endeavors also got much-deserved acclaim: Read My Lips and The Beat That My Heart Skipped.

Dig: 19-year old Malik El Djebena (Tahar Rahim) is sentenced to six years for assaulting a cop. He can’t read or write. He has no family. He’s a French-Arab in a prison where Corsicans are running the show. Soon after his arrival, Malik is approached in the yard by Corsican kingpin Cesar Luciani (a terrifying Niels Arestrup). Cesar wants a Muslim prisoner named Reyeb killed. But since the Muslims are kept in a separate wing of the prison, none of Cesar’s hoods can get at him. But fresh meat Malik can. He becomes the Corsican’s errand boy, but he soaks up all the criminal knowledge around him.

For the next two and a half hours the movie engulfs you in the world of social and religious prison politics. Its corruption. Its drugs and its sex. Its effective education system. There’s something going on within the prison though that is sort of a standard in crime films: prison does not act as a place of punishment and reform, but rather as a criminal college with shitty dorms. I can’t personally attest to this, but every criminal memoir I’ve seen paints the same picture. And as with most greats, I found myself rooting for the “bad” guy, Malik. Audiard masterfully pulls strings and I went from sympathizing to despising him to accepting his chosen path.

The scene where Malik goes into Reyeb’s cell to kill him is incredibly intense. I’m not ashamed to admit I was shaking during the whole scene.

Also, Audiard’s The Beat That My Heart Skipped is available on Netflix watch it now. Check it out.

- Oh Mars