In the movie "Multi-Identity". Visual messages to condemn a French minister

The years after the September 11, 2001 bombings and until the end of the <>s were the worst portrayals of Arabs and Muslims on international and American cinema screens in particular.

But the following years saw a marked change in the process, and Hollywood filmmakers may have begun to reflect a little on the person who was burdened with all the burdens of Western civilization from occupation and oppression, and then stereotyped as a terrorist from the Middle East, especially after the Western military crimes that killed millions in the region over the last two decades.

French cinema was not isolated from this blind condemnation of everything Arab or Muslim, but with the films of the second decade of the current century, it seems that the reality of political conflicts in which innocent people are implicated and condemned has begun to touch the cinematic conscience, so films began to appear that not only refer to the innocence of Arabs and Muslims, but also reveal the truth about the Western conspirator who holds the highest positions in a country like France.

Currently on Netflix, AKA offers a true example of a thriller film, capture the keys to its protagonists' characters and follow the evolution of consciousness from naivety to being drawn to consciousness and the birth of will.

"Multicharacter" revolves around a secret agent of the French special forces named "Adam Franco", embodied by actor Alban Lenoir, who is assigned to assassinate the young Muslim "Mokhtar Al-Tayeb" (played by Kevin Lane) under the pretext that he tried to blow up a hotel in Paris.

The agent impersonates different identities, but this time he leaks into one of the gangs that collaborate with Tayeb as "Adam Franco", his real character in the film, and is introduced to work as a bodyguard for the gang boss who assigns him to guard his six-year-old son.

The agent approaches his main goal, which is Mukhtar al-Tayeb, but gang conflicts lead to the kidnapping of the child, so the agent decides to free him from his captors through a fierce battle, and then confronts Mukhtar al-Tayeb, to discover the truth of the conspiracy that begins with the French minister and ends with him, exposing the process in the newspapers after the killing of Tayeb by the French special operations forces.

Ethical Tests

The first time, when he decides to free the son of the gang leader from his rival kidnappers to his father, although that leader is one of his goals from the operation, and the second time he also succeeds, when he decides to side with the young man "Mokhtar Al-Tayeb", who betrayed his French ally, and invited him to come to Paris, to kill him and attach him to the charge of terrorism.

In "Multi-Identity", cinema says what newspapers sometimes dare not say, as the work conveys the vision that this hollow "seal", which is called "terrorism", is nothing but a sign that is hung on every gate that does not open the doors of the homelands to the colonizer, and that this fact is not known by the soldiers of the colonial regimes, but when they know it, their position will change completely and they will side with the truth.

The message carried by the French film points to an important point related to French cinema compared to Hollywood, which is that the French filmmaker may adopt more realistic and relatively honest dramatic approaches compared to Hollywood, which almost aligns behind a stereotypical vision of the "terrorist Arab" and moves in a very narrow scope when proven otherwise, but does not go beyond that to the Western conspirator against the interests and citizens of the Third World.

French actor and writer Alban Lenoir, who embodied the character of the hero "Adam Franco" has previously made several films in which he shined, and during this work supports his career as a star in action films, and perhaps attention to the nature of the work and the drama presented in it confirms that he was influenced as an author to work first by Hollywood action, and the detective path that belongs to the founder of the American detective story Edgar Allan Poe, but the apparent French glimpse came through director Morgan Dalibert.

Dalibert chose to penetrate the outskirts of Paris and its suburbs, especially those resorted to by gangs away from the eyes of the police, and decided to present a different movement from the American version that relies on the magnified shot of the weapon, followed by the frightened face, then the position of the bullet, and despite the huge amount of weapons and deaths, it is possible to count the major battles in the work, which is no more than 4 battles, the first of which is in the introductory scene.

Dalibert and Lenoir were able to send an eloquent message through the picture, where the conspiratorial French minister meets the commander of his special forces, either at the club while he is running or in a restaurant, or while he is preparing for bed, a simple message that confirms that what is happening in this operation targeting Mokhtar el-Tayeb is an operation outside the context of the work assigned to the minister, and also indicates that vacuum that almost envelops his life except from following his special forces and dirty operations.

Gangster women

There is a deep understanding of Arab and Levantine sentiments reflected in the performances of actors tasked with portraying Arab characters such as Mokhtar al-Tayeb and his brother Hassan, and their friends, and despite all that is credited to the work, a cursory glimpse of someone who breaks his prayers in response to another calling him confirms that employers do not deeply understand the special features of worship in Islam.

The hallmark of family gangs is cohesion, but in Multi-Identities the gang led by Victor is completely disjointed: the wife spies for a rival gang, and the daughter hates everyone and dreams of salvation from the family and trusts no one.

Despite this, Natalia, the wife of the gang leader (played by Zviva Alfeti), turns to "Franco", to bring her kidnapped son, and confirms that the gang will not move, and that its leader will not make any effort because her kidnapped son is not of his blood, while the daughter Mona (played by the young actress Natalie Odzirzegko), approaches the agent after alienating him, and then saves him when he is hit by two bullets in the stomach, and treats him. The third woman at work is a police officer who gave her soul with utmost enthusiasm, killing 3 gang members after the agent was discovered.

The film reveals a brutal fact, which is that the causes of the conflict are wealth, whether that money that the French minister deceived everyone with, stressing that it was intended for a terrorist operation in Paris, or that wealth that the colonial countries sought - and still seek - to rob in the countries of the region, and recruit some earthsons for this and stigmatize those who refuse to give up the wealth of his country with terrorism.