Anticipation.
Abou Sangaré’s debut performance earned him a César award in France.
Enjoyment.
Sangaré brings tremendous depth to the role.
In Retrospect.
Those last 15 minutes are gut-wrenching.
Abou Sangaré delivers a magnificent performance as the Guinean man preparing to face the French bureaucratic maze in in Boris Lojkine’s propulsive drama.
So far, the 2020s have proven that nationalist narratives are still powerful enough to rally the masses into treating those at the bottom of the social hierarchy with contempt, demonising those who flee their home countries to seek a more dignified life. Migrant workers working as delivery drivers are often the ones bearing the brunt of this. Convenience is king, and with the growing Uber Eats-ification of cities, delivery drivers have become a hyper-visible target and a convenient scapegoat for disillusioned Europeans.
This is the contemporary reality that Boris Lojkine’s sobering work of social realism unfolds in, but where many such narratives feature migrants facing abuse at every turn, Souleymane Sangaré, an undocumented Guinean migrant living in Paris, is regularly met with kindness. With empathetic yet unsentimental means, Lojkine gracefully explores both the insurmountable pressures of the asylum-granting system and the precarious conditions of the gig economy. With 48 hours to memorise the fabricated lies he’s been told the authorities want to hear in order to grant him a residence permit, Souleymane rehearses his story beat by beat as he speeds through the Parisian streets on his bike. The tight framing ensures we never lose focus of the anxiety gnawing away at him, while small gestures of humanity are balanced against the harshest measures our punitive society can impose.
