Algiers, 1938. Meursault, a quiet and modest thirty-year-old clerk, attends his mother's funeral without shedding a tear. The next day, he begins a casual relationship with Marie, a colleague, and quickly returns to his usual routine. Soon, however, his daily life is disrupted by his neighbor, Raymond Sintès, who drags him into his shady dealings, until tragedy strikes on a beach on a scorching hot day.
The idea of adapting one of the most famous novels in world literature fills you with anxiety and doubt. Until now, I had only adapted lesser-known and less renowned works. Tackling a masterpiece that everyone has read, and that everyone has already reenacted in their minds, was an immense challenge.
But my interest in the book was stronger than my apprehensions, so I threw myself into it with a certain lightheartedness.
Very quickly, I realized that immersing myself in The Stranger meant reconnecting with a forgotten part of my personal history. My maternal grandfather was an examining magistrate in Bône (now Annaba), Algeria, and in 1956 he had escaped an attack, an event that precipitated my family's return to mainland France. Working on documents and archives, and meeting historians and witnesses of the time, I realized how deeply all French families have ties to Algeria, and how heavy the silence that often still weighs on our shared history. (The director)
