Everybody that Souleymane (Abou Sangare) encounters has an angle. The Guinean immigrant is nothing if not a hustler, zipping by means of the streets of Paris on his bicycle making meals deliveries in any respect hours of the night time to be able to scrape collectively the funds to purchase some asylum papers to current to OFPRA (the French Office for the Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons). But whereas he has surrounded himself with a neighborhood of African immigrants who’re theoretically prepared to information him by means of the method, all people’s service comes with a worth. And the companies themselves are nothing to brag about.
Without authorized citizenship, he’s unable to make his personal account on any of the meals supply apps — so an acquaintance is good sufficient to let Souleymane use his, taking 50 p.c of the income for his troubles whereas Souleymane does 100% of the work. He additionally pays to be coached for his upcoming immigration interview, although he’s given the questionable recommendation to manufacture sob tales about being attacked by political enemies to be able to acquire asylum — that’s, when he’s not being shaken down for much more cash. Life is difficult sufficient for an unhoused, undocumented gig financial system employee simply attempting to make ends meet, however his greatest downside is likely to be the slew of grifters nickel and diming him out of each penny he has.
Boris Lojkine’s new film “Souleymane’s Story” follows its eponymous immigrant over the course of two days main as much as his asylum interview with OFPRA. An easy social realist drama, it invokes the traditions of movies like “I, Daniel Blake” and “Tori and Lokita” by illustrating the Sisyphean duties that weak folks may be subjected to whereas navigating the federal government bureaucracies which might be ostensibly supposed to assist them. But it additionally applies a contemporary contact to the subgenre by putting the distinctive challenges posed by the gig financial system entrance and middle.
Delivering meals on his bike is the one type of revenue obtainable to Souleymane, however racing by means of Paris site visitors on chilly, moist nights is the least of his issues. He navigates painfully sluggish eating places, fickle clients who cancel orders on a whim, and aged clients who don’t perceive the brand new safety code system that his service has carried out. All of those exterior delays ding his score with the app’s omnipotent algorithm, which may result in suspensions and delayed funds of cash that he has already promised to folks throughout city. The supply sequences are virtually Sean Baker-esque of their depictions of the ways in which poverty can flip the best of errands right into a screwball comedy when every thing appears to go mistaken for you at each minute of the day.
“Souleymane’s Story” doesn’t blaze any trails that we haven’t seen earlier than, and it typically will get too deep within the weeds of French immigration legislation for its personal good, buying and selling an excessive amount of universality for specificity when rather less element would have made the identical level extra successfully. But it however delivers precisely what its title guarantees: One man’s story as he navigates all the ups and downs of the 2 greatest days of his life earlier than pleading his case to stay in France. Sangare embodies the character with an appropriately battered resilience, whereas Lokjine and co-writer Delphine Agut hit him with problem after problem that really feel shocking and inevitable on the identical time.
Sometimes Souleymane seems like he’s sprinting by means of a race with no end line, and typically he’s operating into an unmovable brick wall. The movie exists within the house between these opposing outcomes, and its contradictions grow to be its biggest power because it depicts the countless exhaustion of navigating a system that doesn’t care about you just about as a lot because it claims to.
Grade: B-
A Kino Lorber launch, “Souleymane’s Story” opens in theaters on Friday, August 1.
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