The Stranger

French master director François Ozon (Autumn in Burgundy) has cast himself on Albert Camus's seminal novel 'The Stranger'. A powerful tale of an emotionally distanced young man who, accused of murder, is put on trial in French-colonized Algeria. In the summer of 1938. Meursault (Benjamin Voisin, known from Ozon's 'The Summer of '85', among others) is a quiet and modest clerk in his early thirties. After attending his mother's funeral, the next day he begins a non-committal relationship with his colleague Marie (Rebecca Marder), whom he meets by chance at the local bathhouse - and then quickly slips back into everyday routine. But his existence is disrupted by the unruly neighbor Raymond (an excellent Pierre Lottin, known from 'For Full Music'), who drags Meursault into a conflict with a former lover. An excruciatingly hot afternoon on the beach occurs an incident that comes to challenge Meursault's moral habitus. With its sensuous black-and-white imagery, Ozon's elegant and expertly staged film is a visually sumptuous reinterpretation of Camus's classic tale of alienation and morality. The film casts a contemporary look at the work, capturing both the beauty and the sultry warmth of a society at boiling point.

Director: François Ozon
Starring: Benjamin Voisin, Rebecca Marder, Pierre Lottin
Genre: Drama, Crime
Running time: 122 min.
Age limit: Allowed for children over 11 years
Original title: L'Étranger