Is Netflix the new Eldorado of French action cinema? Rejected in recent years by the public and booed by critics, the “actionners” made in France are reborn in streaming. This Friday, Prime Video raffles in 240 countries Overdose, a new thriller by Olivier Marchal. And in a week, on November 10, Netflix will launch the long-awaited lost ball 2 by Guillaume Pierret.
After the boxes earth and blood (2020), Sentinel (2021), the last mercenary (2021), Untiringly (2022) or even far from the ring road (2022), success should be present again for these two productions. Especially since the first part of lost bullet, released in June 2020, is one of the most popular French productions on Netflix, with 37 million views. the same for me bronxOlivier Marchal’s previous film, which was originally intended for theaters.
Streaming has taken over from video clubs and “Direct-To-Video”, “those films designed and produced exclusively for the exploitation of video”, recalls Alex Rallo, an action film specialist behind the popular Twitter account @HeadExposure: “Excellent B-action movies have been made in this context for many years, but this was not really the case in France.”
This revival has not gone unnoticed. the New York Times greeted lost bullet and erected the portrait by Julien Leclercq, the director of earth and blood Y Sentinel.
“Immediately gratifying pleasure”
However, this success is still limited. “It doesn’t create a new appetite for these movies in theaters,” laments Thomas Bruxelle, producer of Untiringly. And there is “a glass ceiling for these movies of around 34-39 million full views over 28 days,” says Frédéric, a meticulous watcher of streaming platforms, who runs the newsletter Netflix & Figures: “These movies don’t explode like like an American movie. But we’re in the upper range of non-English movies.”
But there is something to be happy about. Some of these films have become benchmarks. Since its launch, lost bullet it reappeared four times in Netflix’s top 10 non-English language movies, the last time a fortnight ago. “It happens with relative regularity”, slides the specialist. “Either people decided to watch it because 2 was coming. Or the recommendation algorithm had a specific drive to promote this movie knowing that 2 was coming.”
For Alex Rallo, lost bullet is “a perfect platform”, ideal for word of mouth: “It offers immediately gratifying pleasures, between angry chases and violent melee in a police station. A simple hero, who encourages identification, and clear bets. Quality B series, in definitive Watching a movie on a platform does not imply the same expectations [qu’un film de cinéma]: the return on investment for the public, therefore, must be higher”. The film, therefore, must be rhythmic enough that viewers do not respond.
More impressive and more successful than the first part, lost ball 2 Logically it should confirm the place of this franchise in the Netflix catalog. With his ruthless immersion in the world of drug traffickers, Overdose should in turn seduce the fans of drug traffickers. You will also find in the credits one of the stars of the Netflix series, the Argentine Alberto Ammann. “They are films made for the platforms, of course,” admits Olivier Marchal.
Without reaching the nihilistic heights of Hong Kong, Korean or Indonesian action cinema, these French productions of the genre appeal with their often raw and uncompromising tone. “We don’t play in the same black category, but we have French directors who, when they make this type of film, do it in a radical way,” agrees Guillaume Pierret.
“As soon as there is something different on the screen in the action genre, the boys are there”, continues the director. “They don’t get put off by reading the subtitles. There are so many clever Hollywood blockbusters out there that more authentic offerings need to be seen.”
“There is a curiosity of the subscribers that we greatly underestimate,” adds Frédéric of Netflix & Cipher. “Accessibility is so simplified [sur Netflix] that people are going to give many productions a chance.” An accessibility that allows the French to allow themselves to be seduced more easily by works that they would tend to denigrate if they were released in the cinema.
Olivier Marchal also sees in the success of these films a consequence of the evolution of the state of the world: “People are so saturated with violence and bad news that they don’t want to find it in the cinema. For ten years, it has been getting worse and worse in the lack of civility. In theaters, we go to see completely banned UFOs or comedies. Even I, who am a big consumer of thrillers. I prefer to see them on me, unless it’s Michael Mann.”
Less revered than Hong Kong, French action cinema has always had interesting offerings. without going back to fear over the city (1975), works as TotalWestern (2000), Wasp nest (2002), the transporter (2004), Suburb 13 (2004), point blank (2010), The prey (2011), revenge (2017) or even consume (2018) impressed. But with the exception of pact of wolves (5 million entries) or north ferry (2.1 million), success has rarely been there.
“In France, action cinema has always seemed to me to support a more rugged character, even in the Besson/EuropaCorp era,” continues Alex Rallo.
“The films that have marked the genre in France have rarely given rise to trends or the desire to enter the gap on the side of the producers. Which films are descendants of the success of the ‘Pacto de los Lobos’? Unfortunately, even the most talented directors who have worked in the genre, such as Fred Cavayé and Florent-Emilio Siri, had to change their record sooner or later, due to lack of easy financing”.
“There was also a lack of desire for many directors, who were afraid to rub shoulders with this genre, because they didn’t know how to do it,” continues Guillaume Pierret. And Netflix took advantage of this huge gap to impose itself, explains Thomas Bruxelle: “When EuropaCorp stopped positioning itself in these movies, very few distributors wanted to go there. Netflix told itself there was a niche to take. They wanted to reach the 15-40 year old audience, who like action.”
And action directors have seen their salvation there: “When you look at the budget that it takes to make movies like this and the number of tickets they make, you don’t really have the option to go platform-oriented,” adds Olivier Marchal. . “We rarely do 2.5 million [d’entrées] What north ferry. In the best case, you win between 500,000 and 800,000. These are good scores, but we are maxed out. It does not cover the budget. The platforms provide the budget and the visibility.”
For directors, collaborating with platforms also offers the possibility to break with traditional cinema and offer violent stories without fear of censorship. “We have almost total freedom. It is really a partnership. They trust the work of the producer and the director”, insists Thomas Brussels. “All the dealers asked us to do Untiringly an action comedy. Netflix liked the radical nature of the project and agreed to produce it without distorting the essence of the film.”
While the platforms leave some creative freedom, they nonetheless keep an eye on the grain. “We work with [Prime] of the cast and the editing”, specifies Olivier Marchal. “Depending on where the film is distributed, there are images that impact more than others, curiously more because of the sex than because of the violence. We pay a lot of attention to the image of women. At the beginning ofOverdose, there are prostitutes, they asked me to remove all other plan. They were afraid he would be shocked.”
At 60 years old, Olivier Marchal was grateful to be “questioned” by the Prime team, made up of “young people, who are thirty years old”: “They have a different path as moviegoers than mine. They are great series eaters.” They know platform cinema well, it is good for me to face this type of public and the public that resembles them to try to make films that are a little less classic than the ones I have made, maybe that is a little more rock and roll. “
Already working on his next projects, Olivier Marchal envisions for the theater an “ultra-trash” thriller along the lines of Taxi driver Y no one while developing more ambitious projects for Prime and Netflix. For his part, Guillaume Pierret is already working on loose ball 3. The renaissance of action movies made in France has only just begun. And it makes people envious on the other side of the Atlantic.
After the success of lost bulletits star Alban Lenoir received a proposal to join Fast and Furious 10. But the actor preferred to stay in France. Guillaume Pierret as Régis Blondeau, the director of Untiringly, were contacted by American producers. Difficult at the moment to measure the contribution of these films to the genre: “The international premiere of a French action film is an event for foreign moviegoers who are particularly interested in the genre,” notes Alex Rallo.
For the specialist, “the question will have to be asked the day a French action film has a global impact similar to that of Flash point, Ong Bak Where The raid.“But there are reasons to be optimistic, concludes Thomas Bruxelles: “Netflix has opened a big door for us. It’s good for French cinema. That leaves us with a very interesting field of action. A whole generation of female directors and especially female directors can finally have fun. Now is the time to offer us some tempting projects.”
Source: BFM TV
