In this first feature film, Mathieu Gerault questions the stress of war through a thriller about fraternity and childhood. Driven by remarkable actors and a great ambition, Sentinelle Sud has solid foundations. But failing to structure its narrative, getting lost in abstruse subplots, this drama too rarely has the expected impact.
An effective psychological thriller, failing to elevate the genre
Sentinelle Sud begins with an excerpt from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's Citadel. In this unfinished posthumous novel, the author of The Little Prince tells the story of a Berber lord, who became king thanks to his father's lessons. From this framework, Saint-Exupéry develops a humanist reflection on the writer and his beliefs, in a work that refers to childhood. A setting that will be the basis of Mathieu Gerault's first feature film. After a military operation in Afghanistan decimated his unit, Christian Lafayette returned to France and tried to return to civilian life. But this attempt at redemption is disrupted by an opium trade in which he takes part with his two brothers-in-arms, Mounir and Henri. These veterans, physically and mentally broken, realize that the conflict in which they took part is more nebulous than they thought. 
An American specialty, the veteran film developed widely after the Second World War, before acquiring its titles of nobility in the 70s. At the heart of the New Hollywood, filmmakers like Brian De Palma (Hi, Mom!) or Martin Scorsese (Taxi Driver) explore the consequences of Vietnam, a conflict as useless as traumatic for the country, accusing one of its greatest military defeats in its history. From Journey to the End of Hell to Rambo, many works have elevated this subgenre, a perfect junction between socio-humanist drama and war film. In France, the defeat against the Nazis, then Indochina and Algeria are the main sources of inspiration to deal with broken mouths. From Crabe-Tambour (with the late Jacques Perrin) in 1977 to Des Hommes in 2021, the subject keeps coming back to cinemas. Taking the war in Afghanistan as an anchored source of inspiration, Sentinelle Sud fits fully into this theme.
Excessive ambitions
Mathieu Gerault looks at two veterans. Two soldiers symbolizing the two sides of the same wound: the torn body (Sofian Khammes, always brilliant) and the soul in pain (Niels Schneider). A duality that complements each other as much as it crosses, the bruises of these men being never linked to their condition as soldiers returning from the front. 
Sentinel South suffers a bit from the "two movies in one" syndrome. Not focusing on the "traumatic event related to the war" (which is never shown, not even in flashback, except for a terrifying radio recording), the film takes its time to develop a thriller plot. While the unit had to bring back opium on behalf of a trafficker, Henri, now mute, kept the drugs for himself. To repay the mafioso, Christian and Mounir decide to rob a bank with their military experience. Then follows the infernal gear, after all "classic" of any French thriller. Instead of investing himself fully in this frontal charge against the French military institutions, Mathieu Gerault prefers to mix genres. This interesting approach never succeeds, however: the subplots, which lack density, parasitize the structure of the main story, centered on the reconstruction of Lafayette. With the twists and turns, the feeling that the neo-filmmaker is struggling to keep afloat all the scriptwriting tessitura is stronger and stronger. For his first feature film, he made the unfortunate choice of too big a film. 
Too rich or perhaps too ambitious, the scenario then accumulates clichés and character-functions to keep a coherence. It is clear that they lack scenes to link this set which, de facto, lacks too much impact to convince. It seems a shame not to have focused the feature film on its institutional charge, lacking finesse and falling into the wrong declarative, instead of raising legitimate questions : can one still be a man behind the uniform? How to defend a nation when the army keeps an unhealthy grip on its soldiers?
Behind the clumsiness, the power of the symbols
But it's not for lack of trying. Because Sentinelle Sud has for him solid intentions to deal with his fascinating subject. The social description of these wounded soldiers, between lack of accompaniment and human injustices, is precise and often accurate. The whole is reinforced by a sum of details: the apartment with the makeshift decoration of the first veteran or the disused hotel recreating the landscape of a battlefield. Mathieu Gerault was as serious as possible in describing the disorders. With a lame gait or a fatalistic look, one takes affection for the ordeal that these men are going through. 
An attachment that is also built by the filmmaker's tender look at his characters. Inspired by the cinema of Sidney Lumet (we think of The Hill of Lost Men or An Afternoon of a Dog), Mathieu Gerault describes true antiheroes, lost in a social framework that goes beyond them. To return to Saint-Exupéry, whose work seems to fascinate the director with multiple quotes, it is the setting of childhood that completes the construction of the protagonists. In the film, Christian, Niels Schneider's character, is a peasant's son placed with Mounir's mother, Sofian Khammes. He learned Arabic, neighborhood life, but also fraternity. It is perhaps this element that is the greatest achievement of the film. It is a true, whole duo, whose different trajectory sounds more tragic than fatalistic. In its finale, Sentinelle Sud then moves by its strong choices around the meaning of the expression "brothers in arms". This gives the feature film a beautiful symbolic force, the one it only touches on too rare moments. Film noir, intelligent and fair, Sentinelle Sud does not lack quality to seduce, between its intriguing characters, its precise description of the military traumatic specter and the superb performance of its actors. But Mathieu Gerault overloads his film, which then loses power and spiritual strength. Enough to disappoint the many expectations that were reserved for the film, which will still satisfy fans of the genre. Until then, if he manages to channel his ambitions, the neo-filmmaker can aspire to beautiful cinematographic promises. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5CC3ASlbMc
