‘A Prophet’ a gritty look at prison life

Director: Jacques Audiard

Cast: Tahar Rahim, Hitchem Yacoubi, Adel Bencherif

Cert: 16

The sort of film, it being French, that somehow you feel Hollywood wouldn’t have managed to get right.

Audiard certainly gets this gritty, hard-nosed, violent prison drama spot on.

Rahim plays a young Arab Malik sentenced to a prison term. He’s a teen who has moved away from his Muslim roots and in prison he falls in with the Corsican gang, killing a fellow in-mate to speed his integration into a dark and dangerous world in which he rises to the top.

It’s a grim drama that gives us a shuddering insight into prison structure and how violence seems the only answer to survival.

Star Rating: 4/5