As any real hip-hop fan will tell you, France has always been a rap-friendly nation. The first-ever European tour of American MCs kicked off there in 1982 (the bill featured pioneers like Afrika Bambaataa and Rock Steady Crew). Soon after, hip-hop began to take hold in major cities like Paris and Marseille, launching a wave of rap français that is now the country’s most popular form of music, at least among the young. In fact, France is often considered the second hip-hop territory in the world after the U.S., with hundreds of homegrown rappers occupying local airwaves and streaming sites.
And yet when it comes to French movies, rap music has been predominantly absent save for a few outliers, including the original soundtrack to Matthieu Kassovitz’s 1995 banlieue thriller La Haine, which was performed by the group Assassin, or modest attempts at biopics such as 2015’s Comment c’est loin, about the rapper Orelsan (think of a French 8 Mile set in the very dull, and very white, confines of Normandy).
In Audrey Estrougo’s Authentik (Suprêmes), the most famous French rap group of all time, Suprême NTM, finally gets to tell their story, and it’s one that will please hip-hop heads more than your average viewer. The film successfully recreates the vibes and sounds of the epoch, stretching from the origins of NTM (an acronym for “Nique Ta Mère,” or “Fuck Your Mother”) in the Paris suburbs in 1989 to their first major show at the Zénith concert hall in 1992, which turned them into superstars. But it also plays out like your typical musical origin story, with the kind of rises, falls and redemptions that we’ve seen many times over.
The music sequences, of which there are many, are vibrantly performed by leads Sandor Funtek and Théo Christine, who respectively play budding rappers JoeyStarr and Kool Shen — two kids from the projects north of Paris who indulged in graffiti writing and breakdancing until forming NTM along with beatmaker DJ S (Vini Vivarelli). Kinetically shot by Eric Dumont (My Son) and choreographed by Gladys Gambie, the concerts, which take place in trashy underground clubs where fights often break out before the shows can even finish, are very much the highlights in this otherwise boilerplate biographical treatment.
Much of the drama centers around JoeyStarr, who has major addiction issues and a disastrous relationship with his abusive father, while his partner Kool Shen, who hails from a solid working-class family — his father is Portuguese; JoeyStarr’s parents are Martiniquais — is very much the anchor of the two. The push and pull between the friends/rappers and their ever-present entourage gives the narrative some thrust but feels like a predictable plot element, as does JoeyStarr’s long, tough reckoning with his traumatic childhood, which has the emotional depth of an afterschool special.
Estrougo, whose filmography up until now has consisted of low-key dramas, tries to frame NTM’s story within the greater social turmoil of their time. A clip of President François Mitterand condemning the deteriorating situation of the banlieue opens the film, and there are archives of protests, rioting and police brutality inserted throughout. But the footage feels more like an accouterment than a key ingredient, and the movie makes easy shortcuts from the politics to the music — such as a glaringly obvious scene where Kool Shen pens the lyrics to the group’s militant early hit “Le Monde de demain” (“The World of Tomorrow”) after listening to a news report on the radio.
Perhaps that scene really happened (Suprême NTM received a collaboration credit on the script, which was co-written by Estrougo and Marciao Romano (Happening), but it doesn’t necessarily feel real on screen. And even if Christine and Funtek offer electrifying performances during all the concert sequences — the highlight being an outdoor show in the Paris suburbs that’s illuminated entirely by car headlights — they can’t sustain a drama that heads towards an entirely predictable, if rousing, conclusion.
Premiering earlier this year in Cannes, the €8 million feature opened to underwhelming numbers in late November, while overseas interest won’t stretch beyond Francophone territories where Suprême NTM remains a household name. Meanwhile a second biopic project, entitled Le Monde de demain and directed by Katell Quillévéré (Heal the Living), has already been shot, and will be released as a series on Arte and Netflix in 2022. Hopefully it will provide more of an auteurist touch to the NTM story, or at least the kind of authenticity that Authentik never manages to achieve outside the music itself.
Director: Audrey Estrougo
Screenplay: Audrey Estrougo, Marcia Romano, freely inspired by the early years of the group Suprême NTM, in collaboration with JoeyStarr, Kool Shen and DJ S
Cast: Théo Christine, Sandor Funtek, Félix Lefebvre, César Chouraqui, François Neycken, Vini Vivarelli
Producers: Philip Boëffard, Christophe Rossignon
Cinematography: Eric Dumont
Production design: Emmanuelle Cuillery
Costume design: Hyat Luszpinski
Editing: Sophie Reine
Music: Cut Killer
Production company: Nord-Ouest Films (France)
World sales: WTFilms
In French
112 minutes
