Mathieu Kassovitz took the film world by storm with La Haine, a gritty, unsettling, and visually explosive look at the racial and cultural volatility in modern-day France, specifically the low-income banlieue districts on Paris’s outskirts. Aimlessly passing their days in the concrete environs of their dead-end suburbia, Vinz (Vincent Cassel), Hubert (Hubert Koundé), and Saïd (Saïd Taghmaoui)—a Jew, an African, and an Arab—give human faces to France’s immigrant populations, their bristling resentment at their marginalization slowly simmering until it reaches a climactic boiling point. A work of tough beauty, La Haine is a landmark of contemporary French cinema and a gripping reflection of its country’s ongoing identity crisis.

Winner of the Best Director Prize at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival, and the César Award for Best Film.

Written and Directed by Mathieu Kassovitz

Produced by Christophe Rossignon

Cinematography by Pierre Aïm

Camera Operator: Georges Diane

Edited by Mathieu Kassovitz and Scott Stevenson

Production Design by Giuseppe Ponturo

Costume Design by Virginie Montel

Sound by Vinecent Tulli

Starring Vincent Cassel, Hubert Koundé, Saïd Taghmaoui, François Levanthal, Abdel Ahmed Ghili, Karim Belkhadra, Edouard Mountoute, Solo, Joseph Momo, Héloïse Rauth, Rywka Wajsbrot, Olga Abrego, Mathilde Vitry, Félicité Wouassi, Fatou Thioune, Cut Killer, Julie Mauduech, and Karin Viard