Film of the Cannes Film Festival so far, no contest, is A Prophet, a French prison-set thriller starring newcomer Tahar Rahim. We dropped in to meet him in a rooftop apartment on the Croisette today to congratulate him on the movie, which is Tahar's feature film debut. The posh newspaper critics don't always agree with heat's verdicts on movies, but everyone agrees that A Prophet is the current front runner for the top prize, the Palme D'Or. Wendy Ide from The Times called the film "exhilarating" in her 5-star review, adding "It seems almost inconceivable that another picture with the ambition, scope and compelling dramatic impetus of A Prophet will emerge in this year’s competitive line-up. If the jury fail to award at least one of the main prizes to it, there will be riots on the Croisette." We agree. Tahar, who was born in France to Algerian parents, plays a 19-year-old convict spending his first stint in grown-up prison, where he is immediately forced to kill another inmate on behalf of the prison's Corsican Mr Big, and then makes himself indispensable to these racist gangster prisoners. The other big critical hit so far here is Bright Star, the story of poet John Keats' tragic love affair with his neighbour (Abbie Cornish, aka Ms Ryan Phillippe), but we prefer Fish Tank, a gritty London drama whose cast includes Michael Fassbender (Hunger, Eden Lake, 300). Most distressing film so far is Anti-Christ, which we don't want to spoil for you by giving away too much, but let's just say that someone cuts her own clitoris off with scissors. Nasty!
Heat's film editor Charles Gant is at the Cannes Film Festival
Best Cannes film so far