'Souleymane’s Story': A Gripping French Drama About Survival, Exploitation and Desperation on the Margins of Parisian Society
- James Rutherford
- May 31
- 2 min read
Souleymane’s Story (L'Histoire de Souleymane) (2025) is a deeply absorbing French drama starring Abou Sangaré as Souleymane, a Guinean immigrant fighting to survive in Paris while his future hinges on an imminent asylum interview. Working as a food delivery rider on a borrowed account, Souleymane spends his days navigating traffic, chasing orders, dodging platform crackdowns and surrendering a cut of his earnings to the men who control his access to work.
With his interview only days away, Souleymane is forced to memorize a prefabricated account of political persecution, rehearsing it between deliveries as exhaustion and anxiety erode his grip on the "right" version of himself. The storyline unfolds over a relentless span of hours, detailing Souleymane’s attempts to earn enough money, reach his shelter before curfew and hold together the fragile story that may determine his legal future. Each delivery, missed payment and bureaucratic obstacle compounds his desperation as the film moves toward the asylum interview itself. Forced to choose between survival and honesty, Souleymane must decide whether to continue reciting another man’s story, or finally speak in his own words.
Directed by Boris Lojkine (Hope, Camille), Souleymane’s Story is an incredibly compassionate and perceptive depiction of life on the margins of modern society. Lojkine’s film moves with tremendous urgency, immersing the viewer in the daily machinery of exploitation without reducing Souleymane to a symbol of suffering. Sangaré is remarkable in a role demanding physical endurance, quiet dignity and mounting panic, his performance rooted in Souleymane’s aching need to be seen plainly rather than processed as a rudimentary asylum case. The result is a tense, humane film about desperation and the basic need to be recognized as fully human.
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