BARON NOIR

North American Premiere • TV Series • Political Thriller • France, 2016

Blu-ray • Color • Season 1 • 8x52’ • Episodes 1 & 2

Directed by: Ziad Doueiri

Written by: Eric Benzekri, Jean-Baptiste Delafon

Developed by: Eric Benzekri, Jean-Baptiste Delafon

Produced by: Thomas Bourguignon (Kwai)

Cast: Kad Merad (Rickwaert), Niels Arstrup (Laugier), Anna Mouglalis (Dorendeu), Astrid Whettnall (Veronique) 

International Sales: StudioCanal

U.S. Distributor: Walter Presents  

Original Broadcast: Canal+, February 2016

 

Canal+ steps up their game with this high-budget political thriller from veteran TV scribe Jean-Baptiste Delafon and politician-turned-writer Eric Benzekri. The award- winning Lebanese feature director Ziad Doueiri (The Attack, COLCOA 2013) rounds out the creative team. Comedian Kad Merad puts in a serious turn as Philippe Rickwaert, an ambitious political operator with eyes on becoming the next head of the Socialist Party. But his good friend Francis Laugier (Niels Arestrup, A Prophet) throws him under the bus to save his own political skin. Rickwaert will have to use all his political savvy, cultivating quid pro quos from everyone, including the police and organized crime, in order to exact his revenge. Advance word has this as the French House of Cards, but Benzekri insists he was inspired more by Sopranos and The West Wing. Emphasizing realism, it is the first fiction series in France to use actual political party names and to base storylines on real events.