by Hudson Moura
Co-written by director Mathieu Denis, The Cost of Heaven (Gagne ton ciel, Québec, 2025) is a taut, atmospheric psychological drama that offers a sharp critique of ambition, social mobility, and the seductive illusions of the financial world. Loosely inspired by true events, this Quebecois film is anchored by a gripping performance from Franco-Algerian actor Samir Guesmi as Nacer, a fifty-year-old stockbroker whose life begins to unravel under the weight of debt, professional stagnation, and unattainable aspirations.
Nacer, an Arab-Canadian broker in Montréal, is the embodiment of calculated ambition. Though competent and hard-working, he finds himself passed over for promotions, uncertain whether age, race, or invisible institutional bias is to blame. Struggling to maintain the illusion of success, he enrolls his children in elite private schools well beyond his means, idolizes a self-made billionaire immigrant (Ben Novak), and clings to the dream of social elevation.
Yet Denis’s film is not merely a story of aspiration gone awry—it is a descent into moral compromise. As financial pressure mounts, Nacer is drawn into a high-stakes fraud scheme, crossing legal and ethical lines in a desperate bid to secure the life he believes he and his family deserve. In this world, the mantra “la fin justifie les moyens”—the end justifies the means—reigns supreme.
Stylistically, The Cost of Heaven is a slow-burning suspense film, masterfully orchestrated through an eerie, minimalist score and a precise, almost surgical mise-en-scène. Denis creates a world of surfaces and appearances: luxurious offices, sterile classrooms, cold elevators, all mirroring Nacer’s interior spiral. Each scene is imbued with unease, as if the entire film were teetering on the edge of collapse—just like Nacer himself.
Guesmi’s performance is the beating heart of the film. He portrays Nacer not as a hero, nor as a villain, but as a man who has internalized a system that teaches self-worth through accumulation and validation through status. His desperation is not explosive but quietly tragic, his risk-taking less about greed than pride and survival in a world rigged against him.
What elevates the film is its philosophical undertone. The Cost of Heaven is not just a critique of capitalism or consumption, but a meditation on the illusions we construct—and the lies we tell ourselves. The metaphor of “heaven” is double-edged: it represents success, redemption, and a promised future, but also false expectations, societal mirages, family projections, and the myth of meritocracy.
Denis delicately explores how these illusions—whether childhood fantasies like Santa Claus or adult projections of wealth and security—are never as harmless as they seem. They are narratives we cling to, even as they corrode our sense of self and lead us toward self-destruction.
The film also subtly addresses linguistic and cultural barriers. Although largely in French, Nacer’s outsider status is heightened by his accent, his background, and his non-belonging in the rarefied circles of elite finance. His dream of belonging is never fulfilled; the world he tries to buy into never truly accepts him.
The Cost of Heaven is a sombre, visually elegant, and emotionally unsettling portrait of a man devoured by the very dreams that once sustained him. Rather than condemning or absolving its protagonist, Denis invites viewers to reflect on the systems that produce such desperation—and the illusions we accept in order to keep functioning within them.
It is not a film that rails against capitalism with slogans or polemics. Instead, it quietly dissects the conditions of belief that lead someone to gamble everything—family, career, morality—for a vision of success. 
(3.8/5)