The sandman: Steve Achiepo, inspired by his profession as a real estate agent for his first film

Moussa Mansaly plays a father becoming in spite of himself a sleep merchant, alongside Aïssa Maïga, Ophélie Bau and Benoît Magimel. A strong film to review on television this weekend.

Marked by years in prison, DJO, parcel delivery man in the Parisian suburbs, lives modestly with his mother with her daughter.
One day, an aunt who has just flee the Ivorian conflict arrives at their home with her three children. In an emergency, Djo manages to find them a room.
But faced with growing demand and in the prospect of offering a decent life to his daughter, Djo rocks and becomes sleeping merchant

The sandmanthe first feature by Steve Achiepo, arrives in clear, this Saturday on France 4 (as well as in replay on France.tv). Beginning his career in real estate, he was shocked to attend the unscrupulous practices of sleep merchants, and after being spotted as an actor (in Everything, right away by Richard Berry, in 2016), he went to the staging, with the aim of shooting a feature film on this subject of society little addressed in the cinema.

His courts As a team, at the source, the day of your day And High sweaters were all greeted at festivals, and thanks to this first long arrival at the cinema in early 2023, he therefore made his ambition. Worn by Moussa Mansaly (Valid), Aïssa Maïga (He already has your eyes), Ophélie Bau (Mektoub My Love) and Benoît Magimel (Pacification), and supported by the Abbé Pierre Foundation, which has been fighting for several decades against poor housing, the sandman had very much pleased First. Here is our criticism:

Before making cinema, Steve Achiepo was a real estate agent. And his knowledge of the question necessarily inspired this first long. We follow a delivery man – still marked by his years of jail – who lives in his mother and sees an aunt landing having fled the bloody conflict in Côte d’Ivoire with his three children. He then struggled to find him accommodation without suspecting that he puts his finger in an infernal gear, that of sleep merchants, of which he will become at his own risk an essential cog to offer a decent life to his daughter. Relying on this anti-hero rich in contradictions, Sand merchants Transcend the banal film on topic, by the quality of his writing (situations like characters) and the beautiful work in the light of Sébastien Goepfert (Small peasant) which creates a very New York atmosphere of the 70’s without anything appearing. A director to follow.