Jonathan Millet Director
Filmography Selected
After studying philosophy, Jonathan Millet spent many years filming distant or inaccessible countries for image databases. Alone with his camera, he travelled through and filmed about fifty countries (Iran, Sudan, Pakistan, all of South America, the Middle East, and extensively throughout Africa). He was encouraged especially to go to the most remote regions. This is where he began to learn to capture faces, spaces, to convey an atmosphere in a few shots.
After this experience, he directed the feature-length documentary Ceuta, Douce Prison selected in over 60 international festivals, followed by Tell Me About the Stars filmed in Antarctica, and La Disparition filmed in the Amazon. He then directed several short films selected in numerous festivals (Clermont-Ferrand, Pantin, Palm Springs, Brest...), including Et Toujours Nous Marcherons selected for the César Awards in 2018, and the medium-length film The Wake which had a theatrical release. That same year, he was nominated as a "Talent in Short Films."
Ghost Trail is his first fiction feature film.
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2025
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Joana dans l'univers
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Short
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2024
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Ghost Trail
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Feature
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2021
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The Disappearance
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Doc
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2020
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Grand Huit
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Short
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2020
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Les dominos
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Short
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2017
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The Wake
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Medium length
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2017
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Tell Me About the Stars
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Doc
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2017
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And Still, We Will Walk On
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Short
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2015
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You go Round and Round at
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Night and are Eaten up by Fire
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Short
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2013
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Ceuta, Prison by the Sea
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Doc
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2012
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Old Love Desert
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Short
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⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
'The face of a Syrian refugee is the enigmatic key to this slow-burning drama-thriller... it is hard, blank, withdrawn, yet showing us an inexpressible agony, a suppressed, unprocessed trauma, complicated by what is evidently a new strategic wariness..
...there is an extended, fascinatingly ambiguous dialogue scene, in which soft-spoken Harfaz appears to be sounding Hamid out about the Assad regime, or warning him to just forget about it all and move on, the way he has done.'
Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
'The sombre, strikingly good Ghost Trail...has the shape of a classic spy thriller...the film steps in with the poetry of cinema. At the genre level, the movie is riveting.'
Danny Leigh, The Financial Times
'Jonathan Millet's debut feature isn't so much concerned with globetrotting spycraft as it is with journeying inwards, to the deepest recesses of one man's psyche. The film's immersive sound design mirrors the furious churn inside Hamid's head.
Though Ghost Trail derives tension from Hamid's relentless search, it also stokes hope that its wounded protagonist might find a way back to himself.'
Gayle Sequiera, Sight & Sound
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️'Inspired by true events, French director Millet's film works both as a gripping slow-burning thriller, and as a study of alienation, loneliness and trauma. Cinematographer Oliver Boonjing's camerawork is intimate and attentive while a propulsive electronic score by Yuksek ramps up the tension. Bessa delivers an extraordinary, contained performance as the damaged, dogged protagonist, and the sequence when Hamid finally confronts Sami is a masterclass in controlled, loaded suspense.'
David Willoughby, The Crack
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️'A solidly made, respectfully tactful...the polar opposite of sensationalized. There's practically no on-screen violence, no disturbing imagery, and only a tiny window in the actual experience of the abuse Syrians like Hamid went through around this time. Instead, we're almost exclusively treated to the mental and emotional scarring that comes afterward...That's a much more interesting approach...'
Joseph Tomastik, Loud & Clear
'In a bravura performance...as we relive Hamid's paranoia and recitude the thriller becomes a meditation on the spiritual significances of vengeanace: a hot stone we carry even as it blisters our hands.'Benjamin Poole,
The Movie Waffler"
Thrilling debut about a Syrian refugee in Europe taking revenge opens Critics' Week in Cannes.
An assured, involving tale inspired by true events.
The quest for justice fuels a tense manhunt in the first non-fiction feature from writer/director Jonathan Millet, which balances cloak and dagger intrigue with an acute psychological exploration of grief, loss and exile."Allan Hunter, Screen International
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️'Based on real events, this dramatic thriller opens in 2014 as badly tortured prisoners are released into the Syrian desert, where they're expected to die. This beautifully informs the quietly intense story that follows, anchored by another charismatic turn from Adam Bessa (see Harka). Jonathan Millet expertly keeps the narrative locked on this central character, digging under the surface to touch on wider themes and deep emotions.
Rich Cline, Shadows on the Wall
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️'Bessa is excellent as Hamid, providing the film with a firm foundation to create and resolve tension.
...the film has the tone of a cerebral spy film...a gripping, true-to-life character drama... the perfect mix of action and espionage could make Ghost Trail a must-see political thriller. But, most of all, Ghost Trail is an up-close look at the Syrian refugee crisis and those most impacted by it.'
Josiah Teal, Battle Royal with Cheese
'Jonathan Millet's Ghost Trail played a full year before Jafar Panahi's Palme d'Or winning It Was Just An Accident, which is worth noting in that both films have striking similar set-ups regarding the moral and ethical pretexts of bringing war criminals to justice.'
David Jenkins, Little White Lies
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
'Gripping story. Offers a compelling insight into the lives of those traumatised by war and imprisonment. The film also successfully delves into the psychological scars caused by war and places like Sednaya prison, without resorting to scenes full of violence and gore.'
Mila Curlin, The Indiependent
'The taut new French film Ghost Trail maps the coolly paranoid spider's-web narratives of the 1970's onto the present day...'
Mike McCahill, Cinésthesia
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
'Compelling and tense thriller based on true stories of Syrian exiles tracking down war criminals. The trauma of the Syrian experience shines through.
Dan Carrier, Camden New Journal
'Ghost Trail boasts a fascinating topic, and an excellent lead...
'...Bessa delivers a profound and emotional performance. He is obstinate and vulnerable in equal measures. A relatable vigilante, who possesses the most noble virtues of humanity.'
Victor Fraga, D Movies
"Centering on a Syrian exile tracking down his former torturer in France, Jonathan Millet’s film is a work of visceral intensity and formidable control. Millet has a shrewd grasp of paranoid-thriller mechanics; a refreshing preference for intimacy and clarity over distancing stylistic or narrative fussiness; and two fantastic actors: soulful, movie-star-magnetic lead Adam Bessa and Tawfeek Barhom as a villain whose humanity is the most chilling thing about him."
Jon Frosh,
Hollywood Reporter, Best Films of 2025
"An intimate study of trauma that plays with the gripping suspense of a globetrotting spy thriller. It's a tale of revenge but also one of personal redemption, based on devastating true events...Jonathan Millet does it with a sure and intuitive touh in his feature filmmaking debut. Adam Bessa gives a quietly powerful performance as Hamid."
Christy Lemire, RogerEbert.com
"Sharply scripted...Millet’s expertly tooled movie is far from the first to derive its moral stakes from the desire to find some measure of redress for the victims and survivors of political violence, but it is among the best to also crossbreed this familiar archetype with the urgency and topicality of the Syrian refugee crisis."
Jessica Kiang, Variety
'A Tense, Terrifically Acted Thriller About Syrian Exiles in France'
'It's a juicy piece of entertainment that also engages sincerely with its painful, topical subject matter.
Millet displays a shrewd grasp of paranoid-thriller mechanics...Also has a refreshing preference for intimacy and clarity over distancing stylistic or narrative fussiness...He doesn't linger or ogle, pulling us into the character's trauma-ravaged headspace in a way that feels sympathetic, never sensationalistic.'
Jon Frosch, The Hollywood Reporter
"An engrossing surveillance thriller haunted by the Syrian war.
"A rigorous portrait of grief and acceptance that contains the broken and perhaps mended heart of a political thriller. This complex dance of character and plot is made possible by Bessa's performance."
Chris Shields, Reverse Shot
Ghost Trail leaves a lasting impression, especially from its redemptive ending where choices are made to reward the audience's emotional and moral investment. The film communicates a sense of hope for a displaced people, a roadmap to the future, the possibility of absolution."
Ankit Jhunjhunwala, The Film Stage
Millet draws a rich matrix of values that share a few intersections - which the director expresses by having Harr
"A tense drama...a haunted Syrian Hunts His Captor"
Zachary Barnes, Wall Street Journal
'Bessa embodies Hamid with the tragic emptiness of a man who is unable to properly grieve his losses while being forced to reinvent himself in an unfamiliar world every day. Their combined efforts allow the film to marry some of the best aspects of spy thrillers and slow cinema in a portrait of the ways the wars haunt us long after we escape them.'
Filled with beautiful shots that demonstrate how you don't need a single word to illustrate the pain in a human soul, the film marries some of the best aspects of spy thrillers and slow cinema in a portrait of the ways that wards haunt us long after we escape them.
Christian Zilko, IndieWire
"A hypnotizing Adam Bessa anchors this tale about a Syrian refugee living in France who believes he has found the man who tortured him."
Beatrice Loayza, The New York Times
