Drama movie Alpha, fear of the virus with Tahar Rahim and Emma Mackey

Alpha, the movie plot

Alpha is the drama movie coming out. The plot is set in the '80s, in the port city of Le Havre. A thirteen-year-old girl, Alpha (Melissa Boros) who lives with her single mother. She is marginalized by her classmates because it is said she has a new disease. After school she returns with a tattoo on her arm.

The girl’s mother (Golshifteh Farahani) begins to fear that her daughter is infected, and memories of her deceased brother emerge, a drug addict who died because of the disease, so much so that it makes her increasingly paranoid.

Alpha the movie cast

Tahar Rahim has worked on Monsieur Aznavour, Madame Web and The Mauritanian, for whose performance he received a Golden Globe nomination. In the cast there are also Emma Mackey, who has acted in Barbie and Death on the Nile, and became known for her role in the tv series Sex Education; Jean-Charles Clichet, already seen in Vivants.

Golshifteh Farahani has worked on Paterson and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales. The direction is by Julia Ducournau, who has already directed Titane.

Alpha, the critics’ reviews

The movie has already been presented at the Cannes Festival 2025, where it received a standing ovation and positive reviews. For The Wrap “as Alpha’s family isolates itself more and more, the movie’s ambition expands. Although the rhythms may require some time to get used to, the emotional reward that comes from it is well worth the viewer’s patience”.

For Deadline “even the absolute, relentless bleakness of the movie can wear down”. More severe is The Hollywood Reporter, for which “one must give Ducournau credit for refusing to settle down or take the Hollywood road after winning the Palme, but one must also wonder if her latest feature will please anyone except her”.

The movie comes out in the United States on March 27, 2026.