If your idea of French film is a bunch of bourgeois people sitting around arguing the fine points of relationships, politics, and poststructuralist theory, think again. "The Magnet" is a gritty little film from the streets of Marseille that wants to illuminate a subculture most people don't readily associate with the French Riviera.

Rappers Kamel Saleh and Akhenaton's debut film follows a bunch of loafers through their days as they cheat on their girls, scam their way into second-rate clubs, sell boxes full of rocks disguised as stolen stereo equipment, evade the flics, and sit on bistro chairs as if their work-shy butts were magnets.

These guys are born in France, but since their skin isn't white they're treated like foreigners who don't belong, and we are made to understand that their frustration, anger, and aimlessness has its roots in their disenfranchisement. Even the girls they sleep with vote National Front - no wonder these guys are pissed off. In the scene that rings with the most truth, one of the characters gets furious over a car locking its doors and driving off just because he crossed the street.

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Nonetheless, sympathy for the outcast wasn't enough to keep my attention for the duration of the film. None of the ragtag band is ever seen doing anything nice, and when disappointed girlfriends leave them and angry fathers kick them out on the street, you have to wonder if they don't have a point.

Mistreatment doesn't excuse everything. I mean, these guys are incapable of passing strange women without harassing them, they betray their friends as a matter of fact, and they steal money from children.

I'm a firm believer in the rule that any movie where people drive aimlessly through the night is a good movie, especially if it has a kickin' hip-hop soundtrack. But here, the episodes are too scattershot, the tone is too uneven, and the characters aren't likable enough for the story ever to accumulate any narrative momentum, or much interest. Comme un Aimant wants to be a gritty eye-opening film about a bunch of likeable underdogs, but all I saw was meandering meanness prowling the streets. My advice: lock your doors.

Written and directed by Kamel Saleh and Akhenaton; in French, with English subtitles; director of photography, Denis Rouden; edited by Fabrice Sallinié; music by Bruno Coulais and Akhenaton; produced by Richard Grandpierre. Running time: 100 minutes. This film is not rated.

Cast: Kamel Saleh (Cahuete), Houari Djerir (Houari), Brahim Aimad (Bra-Bra), Sofiane Madjid Mammeri (Christian), Kamel Ferrat (Fouad), Titoff (Santino), Akhenaton (Sauveur) and Malek Brahimi (Kakou).