Selected for the Venice Film Festival 2024, from which it walked away with the Volpi Cup for Best Actor for Vincent Lindon, Jouer avec le Feu, the new film by Delphine and Muriel Coulin(17 Filles), is an adaptation of the book Ce qu'il faut de nuit by Laurent Petitmangin. The film tells the story of Pierre(Vincent Lindon), who raises his two sons alone after the death of their mother.
Jouer avec le Feu will be broadcast on Canal+ on Tuesday, September 23, 2025 at 9:10pm.
Synopsis: Pierre is raising his two sons alone. Louis, the younger, is doing well at school and getting on in life. Fus, the elder, is drifting. Fascinated by violence and power struggles, he becomes close to extreme right-wing groups, the opposite of his father's values. Pierre watches helplessly as these groups take hold of his son. Little by little, love gives way to incomprehension...
Louis(Stefan Crepon), the youngest, is doing well at school and moving easily through life. Fus(Benjamin Voisin), the eldest, is adrift. Fascinated by violence and power struggles, he draws close to extreme right-wing groups, the very opposite of his father's values. Pierre watches helplessly as these groups take hold of his son. Little by little, love gives way to incomprehension.
Once again, Delphine and Muriel Coulin set out to film adolescence, at an age - the onset of adulthood - when it's time to make choices. Working in isolation in this well-connected family, where love seems to be present and listening is the order of the day, the two sisters recount the disappointment and betrayal of family values - Pierre's character is a railway worker and former trade unionist - against the backdrop of Villerupt and its blast furnaces. A reversal of thinking that is all the more striking given that it takes place in an environment that is markedly left-wing, supportive and open-minded.
Or how to tell the story of a current reality, the rise of nationalism in France, through the prism of family intimacy - a kind ofAmerican History X, but told in reverse. Through a resolutely naturalistic approach to their subject, the Coulin sisters probe the milieu of the ultras, the virilism that goes hand in hand with it, and the premeditated discourses that infuse young minds, caught up in thespiral of the extreme right.
Yet Playing with Fire is not a black-and-white portrait of this lost youth. Despite the father's shame, his support remains unwavering. And rather than rejoicing in the way things turn out for Fus - badly, we won't spoil anything for you - the film proves to be more subtle than that, a veritable plea against stupidity and ignorance.
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