The new French prison drama from director Jacques Audiard ("The Beat That My Heart Skipped," 2005), "A Prophet," follows Malik El Djebena from the first day he enters prison until the day of his release. There is little evidence to suggest anything of his life before prison other than his Arab descent and a generalized feeling of impoverishment. The film, rather than trying to provide explanations for its characters' actions, simply observes, letting the audience ask the questions. With this approach, "A Prophet" becomes a meditation on power, race and morality.
Malik (Tahar Rahim) enters prison as a proverbial blank slate. Soon after he is settled, the leader of the Corsican gang, César (Niels Arestrup), approaches Malik with an order to kill a fellow inmate, or face his own death. The man Malik is ordered to kill turns out to be a decent person, offering Malik some of his books and telling him about going to school in prison. When the time comes, Malik almost botches the murder. This is the first time Malik has killed someone, but "A Prophet" fails to discuss how he feels about his actions.
From this point on Malik works for César, who becomes somewhat of a father figure who elicits more fear than love from Malik. As the years go by, Malik makes more connections with men in and outside of prison, establishes his own drug trade and eventually moves his way up to be César's right hand man.
All of this leads up to a power shift between Malik and César. As César's men get transferred to other prisons and his connections to the outside are weakened, he turns to Malik for help. Even without this situation being played out, the film has now come full circle: Malik has gone from the innocent, uneducated delinquent to an intelligent, capable gangster.
"A Prophet" is as much about Malik's journey as it is about the criminal, racial and authoritative tensions that exist in France's prisons and, seemingly, in France itself. Audiard does not show any events that occur outside of Malik's prison sentence for a specific purpose, allowing for a purer experience of the story within the prison, without any of the contemporary political and social context of France. The story works as an allegory for the state of France, as well as a character drama of one man's late coming of age.
The film's style also lends itself well to the kind of reserved, observational approach Audiard wants to create. Audiard brings a documentary−ethnographic feel to prison life, using hand−held camerawork that doesn't draw attention to itself, but effectively relays the gritty nature of prison life. There are a few scenes when other techniques break through, such as when different film stock or slow motion is used, always in conjunction with Malik's point of view.
There are also moments in the film when Malik sees and speaks with the man whom he killed early in the film. There is no way of knowing whether these encounters are externalizations of Malik's conscience, his internal dialogue or a mystical connection with another person's spirit; again, Audiard leaves interpretation up to the viewers.
There is no question, however, that "A Prophet" withholds just enough information to keep audiences asking questions. Ultimately Audiard wants audiences, like Malik, to learn through a trial by fire.
