French film producer Dimitri Rassam in his office in Paris. Photo / Cyril Marcilhacy/Bloomberg
His godfather is Francis Ford Coppola and his family is French cinema royalty, but Dimitri Rassam says he’s carving his own path with plans to make a global blockbuster.
Dimitri Rassam was destined to make movies. The son of Bond girl and Cesar-winning actor Carole Bouquet and French film producer Jean-Pierre Rassam, he’s been immersed in cinema since birth. Francis Ford Coppola is his actual godfather.
Last year, Rassam’s The Count of Monte Cristo was one of the top-grossing films in France. Now he has big plans to produce global blockbusters in English, with a French twist.You
With the help of local billionaires, Rassam, 43, is on a quest to produce a costly medieval saga based on The Accursed Kings, a French novel series that inspired Game of Thrones author George R.R. Martin. The films are set to be shot in English with an all-star international cast, designed to appeal to a global audience. It’s probably the riskiest movie project out of France since Luc Besson’s €197 million ($220 million) science fiction flop Valerian in 2017.
The production, still at its financing stage, comes at a tricky time for Hollywood, which is grappling with post-pandemic, post-writers-strike blues. The superheroes genre, its engine for years, is tired. Disney is living a cultural crisis, while box-office bombs like Warner’s Mickey 17 are dissuading bold bets. President Donald Trump has complicated matters with comments that films shot outside of the US would face 100% tariffs. The industry relies on international collaborations and shoot locations, so the benefits of such a proposal to US filmmakers are far from clear.
While some international filmmakers have expressed fears about how tariffs could hit their business, Rassam is bullish. French cinema has been recovering, with ticket sales increasing in 2024 while the US and UK declined. “It’s a moment of opportunity, because there is this turbulence,” Rassam says, noting that US studios are making fewer movies and are more risk-averse as production budgets creep up.
There is a “gap that Hollywood needs to solve” between huge “tent poles” like Top Gun Maverick, Barbie and Avatar, that provides an opportunity for producers like Rassam, says Daniel Loria, editorial director from trade publication Boxoffice Media.
However, the historical genre of Rassam’s project, with its expensive sets and costumes, may be a trickier sell than the arthouse movies France is known for, Loria adds.
Some previous attempts at making big-budget European movies with international appeal have been categorised by critics as “europudding,” says Huw Jones, film lecturer at the University of Southampton, using a term for European co-productions that forfeit artistic merit to satisfy bureaucratic agendas for state funding. One such example, Jones says, is the 2007 film The Last Legion. The star-studded historical action film lost the studio about US$40 million ($68m) and Rotten Tomatoes gave it a 15% rating, describing its dialogue as “unoriginal, uninspired”.
“Some of those films wanted to work in every market, and ended up working in none,” Jones adds.
In a quiet residential street in the chic 7th arrondissement of Paris, a short walk from Napoleon’s tomb, sits a white stucco two-storey building. Inside is Rassam’s movie production company, Chapter 2, which he founded 20 years ago. Visitors are greeted by a tabby office cat and sit in director-style chairs from his latest films, including The Count of Monte Cristo and the 2023 French-language reboot of The Three Musketeers. There is a Musketeer’s hat on the wall and figurines of cherished childhood characters including Tintin and The Little Prince on shelves.
Rassam gives off LA vibes with long hair, Nike sneakers and a denim shirt. He says there is space for what he describes as the best of both worlds: a film adaptation of a French drama of chivalry, betrayal and violence that’s universal. He wants to combine historic settings with European VFX knowhow, and add American stars and marketing power to make it an international success. The goal is to establish a franchise with several films.
Rassam cites some of Luc Besson’s work, like the 1997 sci-fi The Fifth Element, as a model to emulate. The French-made movie starred a big-name Hollywood star (Bruce Willis) and was made in tight collaboration with US studio Columbia Pictures. It cost about US$90m to make and grossed US$263m at the box office.
The first instalment of The Accursed Kings will have a budget of under US$80m, Rassam says. That’s about 16 times more than the typical French film, but cheaper than many movies in Hollywood, which he says has a “film-cost problem”. He’s currently working hard to pull the financing together, travelling back and forth to Los Angeles to speak to a mix of distributors, financiers and actors. He plans to announce more details, including the cast, by the end of the year.
Rassam already raised tens of millions of euros from investors including cinema operator and producer Pathé, shipping billionaire Rodolphe Saadé, French broadcaster M6, and a few family offices from France and Europe. The money, which will be used for The Accursed Kings and other projects, is being channelled through a European fund called Yapluka, which he set up in January. Rothschild banker Grégoire Chertok is helping him finish a new funding round. Yapluka aims to co-produce about three films a year, with budgets up to US$80m and international partners for each project, ideally in Hollywood. “They know how to make films,” but they’re “running ocean liners,” he says, in reference to the bureaucracy and scale of productions.
“What we have to offer is greater flexibility,” he adds. “As much as I love Dune and Star Wars, this market is saturated.”
French producers usually finish a film, and then try to sell it abroad. But Rassam knows that without a US marketing plan from the get-go, his projects are unlikely to be global hits. He has appointed Patrick Wachsberger, the former head of Lionsgate and producer of Oscar winners including Coda and La La Land, to his advisory board to help.
Wachsberger says that his own new production and sales venture, 193, could partner with Yapluka to help promote its English-language projects in the US. 193 is backed by Legendary Entertainment, which produced Dune and A Minecraft Movie.
The Accursed Kings is not a story that’s known to the American public, so will need US expertise to bring it to market. “There will be a lot of work, with a marketing campaign to be started as soon as possible, just after the scenario is written,” Wachsberger says. The right cast is also key.
Rassam’s endeavour stems from a French strategy to revive cinema-going after the pandemic, a disaster for an industry that still sees 25% less tickets sold than pre-Covid levels worldwide. Pathé, headed by Jérome Seydoux, has vowed that spectacular, big-budget films would get the public back in theatres.
So far, the strategy worked. Last year, Pathé and Rassam topped the French box office with Monte Cristo, a €43m adaptation of Dumas’ novel, with close to 10 million tickets sold – more than Dune: Part Two or Gladiator II. A total of 185 million tickets were sold in the country, close to the pre-Covid record of 200 million. But the film had limited appeal outside of France. Several international distributors asked Rassam to produce something else of similar quality but with international stars, he says.
Cinema is considered a national treasure in France, with high levels of public backing, financed by a 10% tax on tickets, incentives for films shot locally, and regulation forcing the likes of Netflix Inc. and Apple Inc. to produce French-language films. Public agency Unifrance is charged with promoting French cinema worldwide, while the Cannes film festival, which opened this week, can propel local films globally. Two of the ten best movie nominees at the 2025 Oscars – Emilia Perez and The Substance – had French financing and directors. Flow – a French, Belgian and Latvian co-production – won best animated film.
The US film industry has not historically benefited from the same levels of federal subsidies, although it’s something California Governor Gavin Newsom this month called for as an alternative to slapping tariffs on foreign-made movies.
“If you go to a cinema multiplex in Argentina or Korea, you will see that half of the films are Hollywood movies, 40% are local, and the rest is a mixed bag, but with always one or two French films showing,” says Gilles Renouard, the head of Unifrance.
The success of Monte Cristo, particularly with young cinemagoers, validates Rassam’s approach, Renouard says, adding that he has the necessary vision and ambition to echo Besson’s success.
Despite his deep family connections to the French movie industry and Hollywood royalty through his godfather, Rassam is keen to distance himself from any “Nepo baby” narrative. Sitting in front of the photo of his legendary godfather, lifting a small Rassam on to his shoulders, the producer says he’s spent more than 20 years building his own empire, with a solid track record, and that Hollywood execs “don’t give a damn” about his family connections. “They see 157 guys like me every day,” he says.
The challenge with his new venture is getting US backing while maintaining creative control.
“Where we need to convince them is on our ability to manage editorial,” Rassam says. “The key is to be relevant, not to be seen as contractors.”
'The student loan is very high and the knowledge is very minimal.'