TRIBUTES AND RETROSPECTIVES

Sport and cinema

Mercenaire

Sacha Wolff
2016 - France - 1h43

Screenings : wednesday 24 - 4:15 pm - Pathé - 1 - presented and followed by a debate with the film directors and Toki Pilioko - actors

Soane, a young Wallis islander, stands up to his father's authority to go and play rugby in mainland France. Left to his own devices on the other side of the planet, his odyssey leads him to become a man in a world where success cannot come without compromise.

Sacha Wolff already had experience as a documentary filmmaker and wanted to make a film about rugby. In 2011 he went to New Caledonia to meet Wallis islanders and discover their local sport. While there he met his future actors and then returned to Metropolitan France where he began developing a script imbued with a strong desire for fiction. “Even though he has to make a violent decision to change himself and become a man, I wanted the character of Soane to have something very gentle and childlike,” said Wolff. “The question of masculinity is clearly at the heart of the film, in the relationship that Soane has with his father, with Coralie and potential fatherhood, and also with the rugby team. But what is certain is that I wanted to go against the image of rugby players as being ‘all brawn'! I'm quite ‘well-built' myself and I wanted to explore a deeper and more unknown part of people who have atypical bodies, which are too big, too fat, expressing a lot of sought-after virility.” “This odyssey of a kid built like Gulliver is carried on the shoulders of Toki Pilioko, a non-professional actor who gives us scenes which would win any star an Oscar.” (Alain Spira; Paris Match)

CAST AND CREW

Cast : Toki Pilioko, Iliana Zabeth, Mikaele Tuugahala, Laurent Pakihivatau
Screenplay : Sacha Wolff
Cinematography : Samuel Lahu
Editing : Laurence Manheimer
Music : Luc Meilland

Production : Timshel Productions, 3B Productions, Arte France Cinéma, Centre national du cinéma et de l'image animée, Fonds Images de la Diversité

French distributor : Ad Vitam Distribution