THE BEAUTIFUL SPARK

La belle etincelle

North American Premiere | France | 2023 | Drama | 90 min | In French with English subtitles
Directed by: Hervé Mimran
Written by: Béatrice Fournera, Caroline Franc, Hervé Mimran
Produced by: Priscilla Siney, Fabrice Goldstein (Summertime)

Cinematography: Jérôme Alméras Fabrice Dautcourt
Film Editing: Fabrice Dautcourt
Original Score: Audrey Ismaël, Olivier Coursier
Cast: Bernard Campan (Philippe Lamarck), Mélanie Doutey (Virginie), Gauthier Gagnière (Noé), Lionnel Astier, Laurent Bateau
International Sales: Film & Picture 
Original Broadcast: M6, TBA

Loosely inspired by La Belle Étincelle eatery in Paris’s 15th arrondissement, The Beautiful Spark tells the tale of two men whose worlds could not be further apart. Philippe, a celebrity chef awaiting his second Michelin star, is endowed with a temperament even more out of control than his ego. Noé, a young man with a pitch-perfect olfactory sense — and who happens to be autistic — spends his days making sandwiches in a food truck. When they’re both fired on the same day, Noé’s devoted mother, Virginie, hatches the far-fetched scheme of launching a restaurant with “a little something extra” — the majority of its employees are developmentally-disabled young people. Like its real-life namesake, The Beautiful Spark is clearly a socially-inclusive, feel-good romp with a heart of gold.

Director Hervé Mimran began his career directing episodes of the comedy series La Minute blonde for Canal+ from 2004 to 2006. He co-wrote screenplays for Lisa Azuelos’s Hey Good Looking (2006) and Hugo Gélin’s Just Like Brothers (2012). In 2010, he wrote and directed his first feature, All That Glitters, which garnered both the Special Jury Prize and the Audience Award at the Alpe d’Huez International Film Comedy Festival, was named Best First Film by the French Film Critics Association, and was nominated for a César Award as Best First Film. He went on to write and direct the feature films Nous York (2012) and A Man in a Hurry (2018). He has also directed numerous music videos, most often for French singer/songwriter/actor Benjamin Biolay. The Beautiful Spark will be broadcast in France later this year.