In many ways, director François Ozon’s film of Albert Camus’s The Stranger is incredibly faithful to its source. You likely already know the story of Meursault, the young French man in Algiers whose mother has died and who ends up killing an Arab. Ozon presents it all to us in striking black and white, with a central performance by Benjamin Voisin that appropriately features a face that always looks like it’s just about to have an expression, but that rarely does. Nothing is of importance to Meursault, because why should it be, given we are simply here and then will be gone, whether that’s at age 30 or 70.
And while no adaptation satisfies everyone, this one ought to be acceptable to most readers, and will bemuse and chill those who’ve never read the book, as it must. But one of the most important things Ozon does starts right at the beginning, when the film’s title is presented in Arabic before it’s shown to us in French. This is, of course, the story of a French man who kills an Algerian man, taking place during France’s occupation of Algeria. Ozon rarely underlines this vital context, but we can never forget that it’s there—there’s a constant undercurrent of casual racism, as when a movie theater sign in the corner of the frame tells us no “indigenous” people are allowed in, meaning no Algerians. Meursault goes through his life as if nothing matters, but plenty matters to the Algerians who occupy a lot more than the periphery of this story.
One of the frightening things about where we end up is that Meursault is right, to a degree. We all die, and untold numbers of other people have come before us and will come after. And still, life is here, now, and we cannot live as if it’s not. In Ozon’s final scene, we see how true this is, as an unnamed man is finally, finally given a name, and we see that he did matter to those who loved him.
The Stranger is on VOD.
