A good movie

Even though I don't live in France for already more than a decade, I still like to watch a French movie from time to time. Before watching this one, I honestly never heard of it but since the ratings were pretty good, I thought I should give it a try. When I heard about the story-line, I thought it would be some kind of sport thriller like 'Rocky' but it was actually a heavy social drama. It was indeed a very interesting and sad movie about illegal immigrants in Calais who want to go to England but are stuck in France. Honestly, even though I wasn't really surprised, I was still shocked by the attitude and methods used by the French authorities. Basically, if you would give a ride or give a pizza to one of those guys, you could be put in jail since it is against the law to help illegal immigrants. Personally, I thought it was rather refreshing to see a more positive views on these immigrants. Indeed, nowadays, in Western Europe, immigrants are portrayed as thiefs, bugs or terrorists when actually, most of them just want to improve their life and the life of their famillies back home. A part from that, I have to admit that it was still a rather standard and predictable drama. I mean, I don't blame Vincent Lindon who gave a decent performance but I didn't really care about his character and his personal issues. On the other hand, I was really impressed by Firat Ayverdi who portrayed the main character and he gave here a very nuanced and powerful performance. To conclude, it was a sad but very interesting drama and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in French movies.

7/10