Not about the Wire, but still topical

Le Petit Lieutenant is playing at the Angelika: it is a film about a woman head-detective in Paris whose struggle with alcoholism reaches a head when she befriends a young lieutenant new to her unit (major crimes) and they investigate a series of stabbing/drownings across la Seine — star Nathalie Baye reminds me of Helen Mirren in the wonderful Brit series Prime Suspect, in that it adds another dimension to the police-beat drama by tackling the gender bias women face working the clink. Also, le petit lieutenant sheds light on France’s institutional race bias in a realistic, not-heavy-handed way — there is one scene where a Moroccan detective from the baniuele discusses his struggle in becoming police, and the vagaries of immigration politics are very subtly incorporated throughout the film. It’s long, 110 minutes long, and the director has a small but not untenable affinity for long shots of people walking (it’s more for realism than for dramatic effect a la my fave Bela Tarr’s indulgent 12-minute silent-stroll scenes). But I recommend it if you already have an interest in policing, working-class socio-racial strata, powerful yet realistically flawed women characters depicted respectfully in film, and French people.