Synopsis
The Minister (L'Exercice de l'État, 2011) is a French political drama worth watching online for its rare honesty about power seen from the inside. Director Pierre Schoeller walks you through the daily grind of a transport minister, with no grand exposés or showpiece speeches.
A phone call in the dead of night: a bus has gone into a gully, and Bertrand Saint-Jean has to be at the scene. From there it becomes an exhausting marathon — one crisis lands on top of the last, the machinery of state bears down, the ministry haggles over budget cuts, and every decision tests how much of the man survives the weight of the office. Olivier Gourmet plays the minister as hard and worn out; Michel Blanc is his unflappable chief of staff, the one holding the cabinet's invisible plumbing together.
Schoeller films power as a relentless current with no pause, where ideals wear down against compromise faster than you can clock it. If you prefer austere European drama about the corridors of government to the scheming of TV serials, this gives you plenty to chew on. Stream The Minister (2011) online on iFILM.
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