Des Hommes

Doc & Film International will kick-off sales on Belgian filmmaker Lucas Belvaux’s upcoming Algerian War legacy drama Des Hommes, co-starring Gérard Depardieu and Catherine Frot, at the Unifrance Rendez-vous with French Cinema in Paris next week (Jan 17-21). 　　Based on the eponymous novel of Laurent Mauvignier, Depardieu co-stars as the tortured, alcoholic figure of Feu-de-Bois, a brutish troublemaker haunted by a tough childhood and the horrors he saw as a young French soldier in Algeria during the country’s 1954-62 independence war. 　　The story unfolds some 40 years later in remote Burgundy region of Morvan around the 60th birthday party of Feu-de-Bois’s sister Solange, played by Frot. Feu-de-Bois disrupts the festivities, bringing together extended family, friends and acquaintances, with a racist outburst against a local man of North African origin. Over the course of the evening, flashbacks and recollections will reveal the origins of Feu-de-Bois current state and racist behaviour.