22 Bullets

22 Bullets (L'Immortel) is a French crime-action thriller directed by Richard Berry and produced under Luc Besson’s EuropaCorp banner. Set in the criminal underworld of Marseille, the film follows Charly Matteï (Jean Reno), a seasoned former mob boss who has severed all ties with his criminal past to live a quiet, idyllic life dedicated to his wife and two young children. Three years into his peaceful retirement, having yielded control of the empire to his lifelong friend and associate Tony Zacchia (Kad Merad), Matteï is ambushed by an eight-man masked hit squad in an underground parking garage at Marseille's Old Port.

Pumped with twenty-two bullets and left for dead, Matteï miraculously survives the execution attempt against all medical odds, though he is left physically impaired with a paralyzed right arm. While police investigator Marie Goldman (Marina Foïs)—a widowed detective struggling with personal grief and institutional apathy—attempts to unravel the case, Matteï initially tries to resist the call of bloodshed to protect the fragile peace he promised his family.

However, when the conspirators escalate their ruthlessness and target his loyal associates and family, Matteï is pulled back into the violent underworld. Re-emerging as "The Immortal," he begins a systematic, personal manhunt across Provence to identify and eliminate the masked hitmen one by one, culminating in an inevitable clash against the betrayal at the core of his former syndicate.

The central thesis of 22 Bullets is that violence is an indelible stain that defies true retirement or clean escape: "spilled blood never dries." Director Richard Berry explores the moral breakdown of traditional underworld codes, contrasting the archaic mafia honor system (characterized by personal loyalty, boundaries, and open-faced confrontation) against modern criminal depravity driven by unbridled greed, narcotics trafficking, and cowardly deceit.

The film conveys that true redemption cannot be passively claimed merely by walking away; it demands confronting the moral debt of past sins. Matteï's survival is treated less as a scientific miracle and more as a karmic reckoning, forcing him to dismantle the criminal enterprise he helped build in order to guarantee absolute safety for the next generation.

The film invites multiple critical and symbolic readings:

22 Bullets emerged during a prominent resurgence of high-budget French neo-noirs in the late 2000s and early 2010s, alongside films like Mesrine (2008) and EuropaCorp’s Taken franchise. Supported by Luc Besson's studio model, the film combined traditional French polar realism with glossy, Hollywood-style action pacing and kinetic editing.

The film captures the specific mythology of Marseille—a historic Mediterranean port city long romanticized and scrutinized for organized crime, clan rivalries, and the historical "French Connection." Upon release, French and international audiences praised Reno’s commanding performance, turning the film into a modest box-office success ($21.7 million worldwide on a $20 million budget) and cementing its status as a staple modern European revenge thriller.

Aggregated reception and critical consensus highlight several defining aspects of the film:

• Praises: Jean Reno’s charismatic, gravelly performance and screen presence; Kad Merad’s unexpected, chilling turn against type as a volatile mob boss; the explosive, visceral opening assassination sequence in the parking lot; high production values, atmospheric Marseille locations, and dynamic cinematography.
• Criticisms: Familiar revenge tropes and structural resemblances to Hollywood genre formulas; sudden tonal shifts between graphic brutality and sentimental family melodrama; hyper-kinetic editing in select action sequences that occasionally detracted from realism.
• Overall Verdict: A sleek, violent, and highly entertaining neo-noir revenge thriller anchored by strong acting performances and stylish direction.