Bled Number One

A man ascends a barren summit. It is Judas, come to collect Jesus and carry him down the mountain on his back, joking and panting as he does so. After bathing in the river and taking part in a henna ceremony, Jesus leaves for Jerusalem. Judas is concerned for his friend’s safety, since the Roman occupiers look upon the prophet as an insurgent.

Early on in this engaging historical drama, a marquis (played by the singularly droll Jacques Nolot) offers a peddler a carriage ride on a remote country road. After sizing up his benefactor, the peddler fights motion sickness to deliver his sales pitch: “I have here a few objects of wonder, pious images, pamphlets against men of the cloth, newspapers from Amsterdam and London, holy cards, quills, writing paper…”

Kamel, a young man from the french ghetto, near Paris, is coming back to France. He was arrested for dealing drugs, he spent five years in jail and was banned from France for two years. He tries, with his family's support, to find a job and live a normal life. But nothing's normal in the ghetto.

Talk of living wages and religious observances upsets the delicate accord between the boss of a run-down truck yard and his workers in this visually arresting take on the French-Algerian immigrant experience.

In a Mediterranean country plunging into armed conflict, a doctor tries to do his duty against all odds, until the day his destiny is turned upside down…