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The Worst Ones

Play trailer 1:41 Poster for The Worst Ones Released Mar 24, 2023 1h 39m Comedy Drama Play Trailer Watchlist
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100% Tomatometer 27 Reviews 60% Popcornmeter Fewer than 50 Ratings
A film shooting will take place at the cité Picasso, in the suburbs of Boulogne-Sur-Mer, in the north of France. During the casting, four teenagers, Lily, Ryan, Maylis and Jessy are chosen to play in the film. Everyone in the neighborhood is surprised: why only take the "worst ones"?
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The Worst Ones

Critics Reviews

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Dmitry Samarov Chicago Reader The line between fact and fiction always blurs when a camera is pointed at people, but in Lisa Akoka and Romane Gueret’s arresting new feature, it’s more like a game of three-card monte. Apr 7, 2023 Full Review Peter Rainer FilmWeek (KPCC - NPR Los Angeles) The ways in which the roles these kids play impinge on their real lives is interesting... A fascinating movie. Apr 7, 2023 Full Review Katie Rife RogerEbert.com “The Worst Ones” stays true to itself. Rated: 3.5/4 Mar 24, 2023 Full Review Carla Monfort Espinof Deals with the contradictions of cinema's desire for realism with a lot of dark humor, and plants the seed of many interesting reflections. [Full review in Spanish] Jul 30, 2024 Full Review Philipp Engel Cinemanía (Spain) A lesson in humility. [Full review in Spanish] Rated: 4/5 Jun 6, 2024 Full Review Monica Reid Far Out Magazine This first feature by directing team Lise Akoka and Romane Gueret is an unusual film-within-a-film, three years in the making, one which gives a moving glimpse of ordinary lives while very subtly touching on greater issues such as class conflict. Rated: 3.5/5 May 26, 2023 Full Review Read all reviews

Audience Reviews

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dave d Finally, a film that tells you that you should skip it just by reading the title! A strong performance by Johan Heldenbergh is not nearly enough to balance this uneven and unnecessary French film. Lise Akoka and Romane Gueret made their first feature one to forget. Another film with a fascinating concept, but the film inside a film has been done so many times I was hopeful this had a unique spin. The only thing spinning was my brain as to how this was liked by anyone. I can't even begin to wrap my head around how nobody thought this deserved another pass! On a good note, it was in focus! Final Score: 2.7/10 Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars 04/19/24 Full Review Brent M At the risk of sounding snarky, the title of this debut feature from writer-directors Lise Akoka and Romane Gueret could be interpreted in multiple (and unflattering) ways. Suffice it to say, however, this documentary-style drama about a filmmaker seeking to cast his production with nonprofessional actors from a low-income neighborhood (i.e., ghetto) in suburban northern France presents a haphazard mélange of story threads that seem more meandering than insightful or enlightening. The four protagonists who are selected for this fictional work become disapprovingly known as "the worst ones" for supposedly having the most notorious reputations in the neighborhood (though, when honestly compared to many of their contemporaries, they don't come across as significantly different from the rest of the locals). While this offering seems to be attempting to convey how their everyday existence mirrors that of the characters they're portraying, that goal is never clearly delineated nor effectively achieved, making viewers wonder what's really going on in their off-screen lives (not to mention in the parts they've taken on in a story that seems to make little sense). To cloud matters further, in an attempt to show (rather than tell about) what the lives of these youthful actors are like, the picture genuinely feels more improvised than structured. What's more, claims that this film offers a gritty, groundbreaking look into the challenge-filled lives of the economically underprivileged are vastly overstated, given that this territory has already been covered (and better) numerous times before in such other French releases as "Girlhood" (2014), "Dheepan" (2015), "Les Misérables" (2019) and "Gagarine" (2020), not to mention in an array of releases from many other countries. This is all compounded by the fact that much of the narrative is tedious, unfocused, imbalanced, boring and even silly at times. Indeed, how this release managed to capture the 2022 Cannes Film Festival Un Certain Regard Award genuinely escapes me. The underlying aim behind this picture may have arguably been a noble one, but its poorly planned execution and jumbled final cut fail to make that apparent, undoing whatever good might have been intended. Skip this one. Rated 2 out of 5 stars 05/25/23 Full Review Read all reviews
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Movie Info

Synopsis A film shooting will take place at the cité Picasso, in the suburbs of Boulogne-Sur-Mer, in the north of France. During the casting, four teenagers, Lily, Ryan, Maylis and Jessy are chosen to play in the film. Everyone in the neighborhood is surprised: why only take the "worst ones"?
Director
Lise Akoka, Romane Gueret
Producer
Marine Alaric, Frédéric Jouve
Screenwriter
Lise Akoka, Romane Gueret, Éléonore Gurrey
Distributor
Kino Lorber
Production Co
Ciclic-Region Centre-Val de Loire, Cinémage 16, Pictanovo, France Télévisions, Ciné+, France 3 Cinéma, Canal+, Les Films Velvet, Centre National du Cinéma et de L'image Animée, Cinéventure 7, Région Hauts-de-France
Genre
Comedy, Drama
Original Language
French (France)
Release Date (Theaters)
Mar 24, 2023, Limited
Box Office (Gross USA)
$19.8K
Runtime
1h 39m
Aspect Ratio
Scope (2.35:1)
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