While the film that offered him his breakout role (Intouchables) continues to rake in box office dough in his native France, star of the film Omar Sy is already onto the next one…
The young comedian/actor who's currently the toast of France, is reportedly shooting what will be his next project – another inter-racial buddy pairing titled De l’autre côté du périph, or On The Other Side Of The Tracks; except, this time, instead of a wealthy white quadraplegic and a street-smart poor black man, On The Other Side Of The Tracks features Omar Sy playing 1 half of a starring duo of cops from opposite sides of the tracks (as the title says), who must come together to solve a murder.
The film's synopsis reads (translated from French using Google Translate, so it may not be perfect – French speakers can assist):
One morning at dawn, in a city of Bobigny, near an old illegal gambling unit, the lifeless body of Chaligny Constance, wife of Jean-Eric influential Chaligny, the first patron of France, is found; an occurence that shakes all of France. That morning, two police officers from radically different worlds (a cop the financial section of Bobigny, and the other a captain of the Criminal Police of Paris) must put their differences aside and work together to solve the woman's murder.
Again, likely a rough translation, but I think you get the gist of it.
Although, I'm wondering what's so "radically different" about their individual worlds. There obviously must be something about being from "the financial section of Bobigny" that's very different from being a "captain of the Criminal Police of Paris." My first guess was that the difference likely lies in socio-economic class; but I don't know. I performed a search on Bobigny, but didn't learn anything that would answer that question.
Maybe our French readers can assist.
But based on the description of the project, I'm guessing it's a buddy-action-comedy flick, not-so unlike all the buddy-comedy-action flicks we've seen here in the states in which a black and a white man are paired up.
Starring opposite Omar Sy (who plays the cop from Bobigny) is Laurent Lafitte – a name I can't claim to be familiar with.
But shooting started late last month, and I should mention that, to give you an idea of how huge Omar Sy apparently is becoming in France, I read a report earlier today that said he turned down an invitation from President Nicolas Sarkozy, who wanted to have lunch with Omar; you know, just hang out, eat, drink, that kind of thing. His reps said he turned down the invite because he's currently shooting the movie I just described, and couldn't get away to have lunch with the President of the country. Although, some have been speculating that Sy rejected Sarkozy's offer to show his dissatisfaction with Sarkozy’s policies, "and did not want to see the right-wing UMP party exploiting his film’s success ahead of the presidential election in April 2012."
Go Omar 🙂
Anyway, I'll be tracking On The Other Side Of The Tracks from here on, now that I know about it.
No word yet on when his latest work, the box office smash, Intouchables, will be released in the USA (The Weinstein Company purchased international rights to it earlier this year, and also plan on an American remake of the film).
