I Am a Soldier (2015) User Reviews

Way better it's IMDB rating (5.8) would suggest

[johnpierrepatrick · 7/10 · 19 March 2020]

We have here a realist drama, taking place in North of France, in a poor place, with high unemployment. Of course it makes us think to the Dardenne movies, and some bad imitations.

It has indeed similarities - the set-up, the use of comedians that does look like real people (using Louise Bourgoin for her talent, not her sexyness - not to forget Anne Benoît, always wonderful and underused in French cinema if you look only at her talent), and a care of any details to be realistic. Plus of course, the question "How far you're ready to go to survive in our world when you're part of the outcasts".

There are some differences as well, with a darker movie I would say, a certain roughness that definitely fit this story.

All considered, this is a really good movie, I would have gone for a 8 if not for some weaknesses in the plot story.

What a disturbing film for such a disgusting world.

[searchanddestroy-1 · 21 November 2015]

Don't misunderstand me, that's a tremendous dark, bleak movie which I am talking about. A movie speaking of the hard struggle for a young woman to survive. Unemployed and homeless, she finds shelter in her mother's home and also a job at her uncle's kennel. Jean Hughes Anglade has here the nastiest character of his whole career, as a ruthless and disgusting dog dealer, and especially smuggler too. That's a powerful story that almost made me puke. You have here an atrocious, unbearable sequence near the end, and this movie will remain a long time in your memory. Louise Bourgoin is outstanding here as the female lead, she reminds me Emilie Dequenne in ROSETTA.