A Family of Bastards: Benjamin Tranié, formidable Tony Montana from Foir’Fouille (review)
Mourad Winter tackles the French gangster film around a group of endearing broken arms, embarked on an astonishing vintage mafia comedy.
He had already shaken up Dad’s romcom with Love is overrated in 2025. With A Family of Bastardsavailable today on Prime Video, Mourad Winter this time tackles the French mafia chronicle and dynamites the genre with an energy that is as crazy as it is delightful.
Welcome to Chez Momo, an unpretentious café in the heart of Paname. The boss has just been shot down by a gangster on a motorcycle, and his children must take over the business. Among them, Maurice discovers at the same time that Momo was his father. A small, uneventful technology professor from his province, he goes to the capital to dive head first into the deep end of organized crime, relaunching his father’s business with the help of his half-brother and half-sister.
Prostitution, illegal slot machines, schemes of all kinds… At Momo, a mecca of Parisian vice, shenanigans mingle with expensive romances. A small neighborhood bistro in front, the harbor serves above all as headquarters for a family of broken arms who try to juggle debts, the inheritance of the patriarch who emigrated from Algeria and the Corsican underworld, determined to recover their share of the grisbi.
The setting is ideal. And Mourad Winter focuses on the atmosphere. It recreates a deliciously vintage Paris of 1997, populated with improbable figures, small talkative strokes and lines that seem to come out of a worn-out VHS. A warm and friendly atmosphere that immediately makes you want to sit at the Chez Momo counter.
Distribution largely contributes to this success. Hakim Jemili and Laura Felpin shine in a more restrained register than usual. It must be said that in the middle of these reconstituted siblings, Benjamin Tranié quickly took control of the barracks. He was the third thief of Love is overrated. This time, it is he who finds himself in the center of gameabsolutely irresistible swag baroque, cumbersome enthusiasm and quaint coolness. An improbable thug – the “Tony Montana from Foir’Fouille” as his sister describes – who grows in power over the course of the film and who very quickly takes the measure of the family clan. Benjamin Tranié has an extraordinary charisma, literally. An attitude bigger than life which bursts the screen in A Family of Bastards. Perfectly surrounded, it is true, by very sharp second knives: Kad Merad, as the wise old man at the end of the counter, and Florence Foresti, as the excitable old harlot, line the bottom of the harbor and give it a comforting warmth. We are really good at Chez Momo.
Of course, the film is not without its flaws. The storyline, in particular, is a little fragile and drags on. The siblings’ success story in Parisian organized crime is struggling to hold together and rests on some rather thick strings. Mourad Winter also seems to be constantly searching for the right tone without ever really deciding. His farce in the air of Demons of Jesus hesitates between several registers and switches in the blink of an eye towards the dark and dramatic thriller. It all hangs by a thread. The balance is delicate.
But Benjamin Tranié miraculously manages to hold everything together. And at the end of the day, we willingly let ourselves be adopted by this Family of Bastards.
A Family of Bastards, by Mourad Winter, to watch on Prime Video from June 12, 2026. Duration: 1h45.
