Product Description

Condemned to six years in prison, Malik El Djebena, part Arab, part Corsican, cannot read or write. Arriving at the jail entirely alone, he appears younger and more fragile than the other convicts. He is 19 years old. Cornered by the leader of the Corsican gang currently ruling the prison, he is given a number of missions to carry out, toughening him up and gaining the gang leader's confidence in the process. Malik is a fast learner and rises up the prison ranks, all the while secretly devising his own plans...

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #18818 in DVD
• Brand: Sony
• Released on: 2010-08-03
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: AC-3, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: French, Portuguese, Spanish
• Subtitled in: English, Portuguese, Spanish
• Dubbed in: Spanish
• Dimensions: .15 pounds
• Running time: 155 minutes

Amazon.com
In his labyrinthine portrait of a convict turned kingpin, Jacques Audiard (A Self Made Hero) combines the grittiness of HBO's Oz with the shifting loyalties of a Leone western. After assaulting a cop, Malik (riveting newcomer Tahar Rahim) earns a six-year prison bid. Though illiterate, the 19-year-old speaks French and Arabic. Instead of congregating with the Muslim inmates, he keeps to himself, providing a perfect target for Mob boss César (Niels Arestrup of Audiard's The Beat That My Heart Skipped), who makes him a Godfather-like offer he can't refuse: kill Reyeb (Hichem Yacoubi), an Arab set to testify against the Corsicans, or meet his maker. Malik decides he would prefer to live (in a surrealistic touch, Reyeb's ghost will haunt him for the rest of the film). In return, Luciani offers him protection but stops short of treating him like an equal. When Malik isn't serving coffee and making deliveries, he studies French and Corsu. With what he learns from the mobsters, he befriends two other loners, Ryad (Adel Bencherif) and Jordi the Gypsy (Reda Kateb), and starts a drug-smuggling operation. The years pass, and Malik takes advantage of his parole leaves to work both sides of the fence, and when the authorities transfer César's crew to a different facility, the balance of power shifts from the aging master to the model student. At 149 minutes, A Prophet feels more like a miniseries than a movie, but there are no dead spots, no wasted moments, resulting in Audiard's most fully realized vision to date. --Kathleen C. Fennessy

Video Description
"As epic as The Godfather." -Kevin Maher,The London Times

"Like The Godfather, which it regularly recalls, A Prophet serves up crime as a metaphor for life and power…" -John Anderson, Wall Street Journal

"The film's hero is a cousin to the protagonists of The Godfather or Scarface, but the movie writes its gangland saga without phony mob glamour." - Robert Horton, Everett Herald

"If Malik doesn't remind you of Al Pachino's Michael Corleone on his journey from innocence to corruption in The Godfather saga, well…he should. A Prophet is similarly, startlingly momentous." -Stephen Rea, The Philadelphia Inquirer

"A Prophet is a new crime classic." -Peter Travers, Rolling Stone

"4 out of 4 stars." -Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

"A stylish revelation, recalling The Godfather…" -James Verniere, The Boston Herald

"A Prophet is Godfather good…" -Karen Durbin, Elle

"A Godfather saga set behind bars, Audiard's riveting tale of a young Arab's rise within the inmate hierarchy is as compelling as filmmaking gets." -Paul Ennis, Now Magazine