French cinema rarely ventures into full-blown sci-fi — a genre largely dominated by deep-pocketed U.S. productions — but filmmaker Aude Lea Rapin (“Heroes Don’t Die”), rose to the challenge with “Planet B,” a dystopian thriller headlined by Adele Exarchopoulos (“Beating Hearts,” “Inside Out 2”) and Souheila Yacoub (“Dune 2”) playing rebels with a cause. The movie world premieres at Venice where it kicks off the Critics’ Week section.
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Like many sci-fi movies, “Planet B” has a politically charged storyline, centering on hardcore climate activists who get locked up in a virtual prison in a seemingly idyllic location. Among the hot-button topics explored in the movie are immigration, police brutality, the limits of radical activism and threats to democracy.
Yacoub and Exarchopoulos star alongside an ensemble cast of up-and-comers, including India Hair, Jonathan Couzinié, Yassine Stein, Paul Beaurepaire and Eliane Umuhire.
Exarchopoulos plays Julia, the leader of the group of eco-activists who are imprisoned and tortured psychologically, while Yacoub plays an investigative Iraqi journalist forced to live under a false identity in France, where she’s undocumented and lives precariously. Their lives intersect after Yacoub’s character stumbles on a digital device allowing her to visit the virtual prison where Julia and the other eco-activists are imprisoned. Scored by Bertrand Bonello, the movie was produced by Eve Robin at Les Films du Bal and was co-produced by Orange Studio. Studiocanal is selling the film internationally. It marks Rapin’s follow up to her feature debut “Heroes Don’t Die,” which opened at Critics’ Week in Cannes in 2019.
Exarchopoulos says she “doesn’t necessarily need to embrace the morality of my characters, but it’s always nice when, on a human level, there is a form of connection.” The actor, who broke through in 2013 with a Cannes Palme d’Or winning performance in “Blue Is the Warmest Color,” says she was struck by Rapin’s vision to tell this story with limited resources and alluded to events that happened in the French region of Notre-Dame-des-Landes, where violent protests erupted against a project to build an airport a few years ago, as well as the Yellow Jacket movement. “She wanted to precisely address the present through this virtual prison that is built to silence dissidents,” Exarchopoulos says.
“The film addresses several subjects that interest me, and in particular the courage of commitment, sacrifice,” she says. “When there is no political response, what is the social and collective response? These issues are really timely in our world but are tackled through science fiction and genre.”
Yacoub, who most recently starred in “Dune 2” and Noemie Merlant’s “The Balconettes,” says that although she never picks role because of a political theme, she found the meaning of “Planet B” to be “beautiful and strong” because it “mixed science fiction with the harshness of what we experience today.” She mentions the demonstrations filled with young people that have taken place in France, whether it was against the immigration laws, police brutality or the rise of the far right.
Exarchopoulos has dived into genre before. Last year, she starred in the Cesar prizewinning “The Animal Kingdom,” another dystopian film taking place in a near future where a genetic disease has caused people to transform into creatures. But “Planet B” is different, Exarchopoulos says, because it was made on a much tighter budget.
The film, which pays tribute to climate activists such as Greta Thunberg and Camille Etienne, tackles pressing issues. “For me, cinema is meant to raise questions, not necessarily give answers. ‘Planet B’ asks what we are willing to do when faced with the collapse of our world, whether it’s political or climatic.” Exarchopoulos says she “(doesn’t) have the courage and the level of commitment of (her) character, but coming close to it through (her) character is exhilarating.”
Plot-wise, “Planet B” goes quite far in the realms of science fiction, which on paper must have looked daunting, especially considering the modest budget and profile of Rapin, who isn’t a genre expert.
When she decided to take on the project, Exarchopoulos says it “felt like taking a risk, like a bungee jump that you do.” “I told myself: It’s either make or break. And at the same time I found the subject so profound that I wanted to be involved in it,” she says, adding that it was “a bit of the same feeling” she had when she met the directors of “Zero Fuck Given,” which earned her a Cesar nomination for best actress. “I said to myself: Whatever happens, I want to be there.”
Yacoub says she found the script to be a page-turner. “I couldn’t put it down and it’s rare for me. I’m a slow reader and I tend to be easily distracted. But not with this one. I read it fast and thought: ‘What is this thing that is genial, so audacious and a bit bizarre.'” “I wasn’t sure I understood everything but felt that there was an energy that I loved.” She said once she met Rapin, it was “obvious” that she had to make the film. “She’s a director who made a lot of documentaries before and wanted to make a film about an issue that touches her on a personal level and at the same time make it entertaining,” Yacoub says.
In “Planet B,” Yacoub plays a character inspired by a friend of Rapin, Nour, who was on set and helped her nail the Iraqi accent when she spoke Arabic and English. “It was really touching to see her on set and see how courageous she was. I wanted her strength to be reflected in my character,” Yacoub says.
One of the particularity of the performance is that her character doesn’t speak a word of French. “I loved playing this foreign character, since I’m neither Iraqi nor a journalist, and playing in English.” Even if she had to force the Iraqi accent, which she doesn’t have since she’s perfectly fluent.
Yacoub says she was touched by her character and Exarchopoulos’ because they make mistakes. “I didn’t want her to be just a head-down warrior. I really wanted her to be human and make mistakes too. There are often heroes who are a little too perfect, too kind, who understand things better than everyone else. And I find the flaws so beautiful. And I find that sometimes it’s lacking in films, especially in female roles. We have flaws and we make mistakes. And that’s what I find touching in these two roles.”
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Both Yacoub and Exarchopoulos have the experience of working on major Hollywood productions. The latter most notably voiced the character of Ennui in “Inside Out 2.” She had already worked on the French voice cast of “Elementals,” when she was contacted for “Inside Out 2.” “They must have identified boredom with France because they asked me to keep my French accent!” she says.
Exarchopoulos says she was in the middle of filming “L’Amour Ouf” in the South of France and had a very difficult scene that lasted all night before she traveled to Paris for the meeting. “I arrive in Paris and I do everything to cancel, because I had slept two hours and was convinced I was going to screw it up,” she says. But ultimately she was exactly in the right mindset for the role of Ennui. She says “Inside Out 2” director Kelsey Mann showed her “pictures of his birthdays to show the evolution during adolescence, how you deteriorate and look grumpy.” In the end, she says she had a great time with Mann and the Pixar team. “They told me: We’re going to have fun, and it’s exactly what happened!”
Yacoub says her experience on “Dune 2” has opened doors for her outside of France. “I already had projects planned before and people in the film industry in France were familiar with my name but I didn’t have that level of popularity overseas. I’m receiving noticeably more scripts than last year and I’m working in the U.S. more, and I hope in more countries soon.” A native of Switzerland, Yacoub speaks multiple languages, including Flemish, German and English, which she spoke when she was in the national team of gymnastics. She also learned Kurdish to play a Kurdish warrior in season 2 of “No Man’s Land,” the thriller series that aired on Arte.
She’s now starring opposite Nicolas Cage and FKA Twigs in “The Carpenter’s Son” in Greece.
“This project is totally crazy. It’s a horror film about the childhood of Jesus,” she says. After bonding with Denis Villeneuve on the shoot of “Dune 2,” Yacoub hopes for another opportunity to reteam. “We’re still very much in touch; and yes, we told each other we’d work again together in the future.”
Exarchopoulos, meanwhile, is currently shooting “Chien 51,” a dystopian thriller directed by Cedric Jimenez (“November,” “The Stronghold”), and based on Laurent Gaudé’s bestseller by the same name, set in a near future where A.I. is over-powerful.
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