What the Day Owes the Night

What the Day Owes the Night (Ce que le jour doit à la nuit, 2012) is a French-Algerian period romance directed by Alexandre Arcady — watch it online on iFILM. The film follows Younes, a young Algerian boy placed in his uncle's care in Oran, who is rechristened Jonas and grows up among the French settler community of a coastal town called Rio Salado in the 1930s.

Nora Arnezeder plays Émilie, the one girl the entire circle of friends silently loves, and Fuad Ait Aattou plays the adult Jonas whose feeling for her outlasts every shift the decades throw at both of them. The backdrop is colonial Algeria on the edge of the upheavals that would define the twentieth century, but Arcady keeps the political at arm's length — this is a story about what time does to love that started in the wrong moment. Anne Parillaud and Vincent Perez anchor the older generation's storyline.

At 162 minutes, the film takes its time the way the source novel does. It was adapted from a bestselling book by Yasmina Khadra, one of the most widely translated Algerian writers working in French. The pacing won't suit everyone, but for viewers who want a large-canvas romance with real historical texture, it holds. Stream What the Day Owes the Night (2012) on iFILM.