Blue is the Warmest Color star Adèle Exarchopoulos is staying busy, having finished a highly-anticipated film and joining another. First up, she’s starring alongside Matthias Schoenaerts in Michaël R. Roskam‘s The Drop follow-up Racer and the Jailbird, recently picked up by the newly-launched distribution company Neon. Likely stopping by Cannes, check out the first look above and synopsis below for the French-language, Belgian-set romantic thriller from the director of Bullhead.
The drama takes place in the fast-paced world of racing, and centers on a story of love at first sight when gangster Gino aka ‘Gigi’ (Matthias Schoenaerts) meets Benedicte aka ‘Bibi’ (Adèle Exarchopoulos), a wealthy and fearless racing driver. Gigi and Bibi fall madly in love, but with fate stacked against them their loyalties will be pushed to the limit. How much can their love endure to save what may already be lost?
In other news, Screen Daily reports that she’s joined Oleg Ivenko and Sergei Polunin in Ralph Fiennes‘ next directorial effort The White Crow. Based on the life of Rudolf Nureyev, David Hare‘s script follows his defection from the Soviet Union in 1961. Exarchopoulos will take the role of his friend Clara Saint who helped with his choreography. “Ever since Julie Kavanagh gave me advance proofs of the early chapters of her biography of Nureyev, back in 1999, I have been inspired and moved by the story of his student years and his decision to defect to the West. This is a story of an uncompromising spirit, of homeland and ideologies that restrict, and of friendship,” says Fiennes. “It is equally, a tale about the life and ballet culture he left behind in Russia.”
Racer and the Jailbird will likely have a festival premiere this year, while The White Crow begins production this summer.