Graphicallly violent, BAFTA-winning prison drama from acclaimed French director Jacques Audiard ('Read My Lips', 'The Beat That My Heart Skipped'). Sentenced to six years in a brutal French prison, 19-year-old petty criminal Malik El Djebena (Tahar Rahim) soon realises he has to learn the ropes if he is to survive. With the inmates mostly members of either Corsican or Arab gangs, Malik finds himself having to carry out a series of brutal rites of passage as the leader of the prison's Corsican gang Cesar Luciani (Niels Arestrup) orders him to carry out a number of 'missions' aimed at proving his allegiance. As Malik rises to the challenges he is set, gaining respect from his peers, and with his confidence and power growing, he begins to develop his own plans, placing him on a collision course with his gang boss.

Jacques Audiard directs this French relationship drama detailing the bond that develops between two people, both profoundly damaged in different ways. The film starts by telling two parallel stories: one of Ali (Matthias Schoenaerts), a homeless father struggling to care for his five-year-old son, and the other of Stephanie (Marion Cotillard), a woman who loses her legs in an accident while working as a trainer of killer whales. Both strong, idiosyncratic characters who are used to defining the parameters of their personal relationships, their union forces them out of the emotional safety zones they have each developed for the purposes of self-protection.