Netflix AKA review: Budding action star Alban Lenoir excels again

Over the previous few years, motion followers have been handled to a run of strong French programming on Netflix. Athena was probably the greatest films of 2022, Julien Leclercq’s Sentinelle is a strong darkish Olga Kurylenko thriller, Ganglands (and the film it was primarily based on, Braquers) are glorious crime fare, and Misplaced Bullet and its sequel outdo even the Quick and Livid franchise in terms of explosive vehicular motion.

The most recent entry on this burgeoning scene is AKA, a brand new Netflix pickup that stars Alban Lenoir as Adam Franco, a extremely expert special-ops agent confronted with considered one of his most harmful assignments but. Franco is implanted undercover on the safety staff of a infamous crime lord (notorious soccer legend Eric Cantona, a tricky man as soon as suspended from the game for kicking a fan). Franco makes an enormous impression after rapidly rendering the top of safety unconscious after a verbal spat, and he turns into the bodyguard for the crime lord’s bullied son, instructing the kid methods to combat and defend himself.

Picture: Nicolas Auproux/Netflix

It’s just about “Man on Fireplace lite” — one other film that appears impressed by Philip Nicholson’s 1980 novel Man on Fireplace. AKA isn’t an official adaptation of the guide, like Élie Chouraqui’s 1987 French film model or Tony Scott’s stylized 2004 thriller. But it surely has so much in frequent with them: It’s a darkish crime story a couple of grizzled operative bonding with a baby, and the lengths that operative will go when the kid is in peril. Whereas it lacks Scott’s directorial aptitude, AKA has one thing few different films have: Alban Lenoir.

Lenoir began his profession as a stunt performer, engaged on a wide range of French productions and on Pierre Morel’s 2008 game-changer Taken. After a sequence of small elements, he obtained his massive break in 2015’s French Blood, which screened at TIFF and noticed Lenoir nominated for a Lumières Award for Most Promising New Actor.

A number of years after that got here Misplaced Bullet, a tightly contained vehicular thriller the place Lenoir performs Lino, a grasp mechanic and thief pulled right into a scheme by crooked cops and framed for homicide. As a way to show his innocence, he has to search out the final remaining piece of proof from the crime — a single misplaced bullet.

Picture: Julien Goldstein/Netflix

Misplaced Bullet and Misplaced Bullet 2 are among the many greatest motion films of the last decade, utilizing easy narratives to assemble elaborate, kinetic set items. The fistfights are brutal, the automobile chases are electrical (typically actually), and it’s a turbo-charged motion sequence paying homage to the early Quick and Livid films.

However Lenoir is the key sauce to those film’s recipes. He all the time brings a relaxed, intense, grounded vitality to his roles, with a face that screams, “This man has been in quite a lot of fights.” Lenoir strikes like an athlete and hits like a truck, and whereas he performs extremely succesful characters expert in violence, he imbues them with an Everyman vitality. His characters get hit loads, and are continuously exhausted by the grueling fights they wind up in. In AKA, there’s a humorous scene the place Adam merely needs to take a nap, however retains getting interrupted by notifications and directions from his handler (who he communicates with by means of PlayStation voice chat, avid gamers).

Picture: Nicolas Auproux/Netflix

Picture: Netflix

Lenoir can also be a author, and he co-wrote the screenplays for each Misplaced Bullet films and AKA. AKA sees him reuniting with director and co-writer Morgan S. Dalibert, the cinematographer on the Misplaced Bullet films. (The 2 additionally beforehand labored collectively on 2005’s New World, Dalibert’s directorial debut.) A few of the motion scenes stand out in AKA, notably a posh brawl in a drug den and a combat exterior a membership proven by means of CCTV. Dalibert additionally repeatedly frames motion in the back of lengthy, slim pictures, including depth to a few of the sequences, and he takes enjoyment of telegraphing objects that will probably be utilized in a combat — lingering on a hook on a wall to get viewers enthusiastic about how it is going to be brutally deployed.

AKA’s overarching narrative by no means actually gels — there’s an unlimited conspiracy concept floating across the edges of the film, however it isn’t given sufficient time to essentially come into focus. The film’s tempo additionally slows because it stops to offer some characters extra particular backstories, which is a disgrace, as a result of the actors have been already filling in quite a lot of these gaps by means of their performances. Fortunately, Lenoir’s distinctive presence helps elevate the film to strong streaming fare.

AKA is at its greatest when it showcases Alban Lenoir, Motion Star, fairly than its personal standing as a much less fashionable Man on Fireplace. It’s nonetheless price watching for those who’re within the new wave of French motion cinema, and considered one of its most intriguing stars. However for those who haven’t seen the Misplaced Bullet films but, positively prioritize these for glorious Lenoir motion.

AKA is streaming on Netflix now.