11/07/2024 - The filmmaking duo, who proved itself in Hollywood with the success of the last two entries in the Bad Boys franchise, is about to shoot the sequel to Gangsta

Directors Adil El Arbi and Bilal Fallah (© Maureen de Wit)

Adil El Arbi and Bilal Fallah are spending the summer in Belgium to shoot Patsers, the sequel to their successful 2018 film Gangsta (Patser) [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fal…
interview: Matteo Simoni
film profile].

Noticed thanks to their energetic second feature Black [+see also:
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interview: Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fal…
interview: Martha Canga Antonio
film profile], an update on Romeo and Juliet in the heart of a multicultural Brussels, selected in the Discovery section at Toronto and in competition at the Black Nights in Tallinn, the directors were quick to go on an American adventure, cutting their teeth first on the series Snowfall before inheriting an ambitious project: to relaunch the Bad Boys franchise and put back on the saddle the cult 1990s duo of Will Smith and Martin Lawrence, aka Mike and Marcus, the two cops who don’t play by the rules. Bad Boys for Life, released in January 2020 before Covid closed theatres all around the world, was nevertheless a resounding success. The two filmmakers then found themselves hired by Marvel for the series Miss Marvel, and followed quickly with a fourth chapter in the franchise, Bad Boys Ride or Die, released in early June, which is already enjoying great success since the film has made more than $360 million at the world box office after just a few weeks in cinemas. While we wait for an eventual fifth episode of Bad Boys, El Arbi and Fallah will spend a studious summer shooting their new Belgian feature following Rebel [+see also:
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trailer
interview: Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fal…
film profile], selected in Midnight Screenings in Cannes in 2022.

The criminal underworlds of Anvers and the Netherlands (with a detour through Dubai) are once again at the heart of the problems confronting Adamo (another bad boy) and his friends. The filmmakers have worked for several years with investigative journalist Joris van der Aa (specialised in drug-related crime in Anvers) and have entrusted the script to Ruben Vermeersch, Sven Huybrechts, Bram Renders and El Arbi himself.

Here’s the story: five years after the events of Gangsta, Adamo is implicated even deeper into the cocaine trafficking that is increasingly plaguing the city of Anvers. His childhood friends lead regular lives and refuse all contact with him. Jana, the new boss of the KALI drug cartel, follows him closely. The fall will come soon for Adamo. But when one of their relatives dies during a fight between cartels, the four gangsters come together to follow one goal only: to take their revenge. “Even if Patsers is the sequel to Gangsta where we follow the four main characters and their adventures”, explains Adil El Arbi, “the problems of the Anvers drug milieu have evolved. Patsers will be a darker and more serious film without giving up the humorous and accessible DNA of Gangsta.”

Returning as the four gangstas are Matteo Simoni (nominated at the Magritte awards for Marina [+see also:
trailer
interview: Cristiano Bortone
film profile] and seen recently in Wil [+see also:
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film profile]), Nora Gharib, Saïd Boumazoughe and Junes Lazaar. The shoot will last 9 weeks and take place in the Anvers region.

Patsers is produced by A-Team Production (Belgium), in collaboration with The Searchers (Belgium) which will also take care of the film’s distribution in the Benelux, and Fiction Valley (Netherlands). The film received support from the Flanders Audiovisual Funds, Screen Flanders, the Belgian Tax Shelter, and the Netherlands Film Production Incentive as well as from Amazon Prime, DPG, RTL Netherlands and the RTBF.

(Translated from French)