France

Strange things are happening at a school in France, something unknown is approaching, something enchanting and dangerous. In a dream-like timelessness, children dance the tango and recite poems. All at once, Daniel is alone with Marthe.Read More »

The tetralogy pieces are dominated by the concept and presence of death, foreclosure, fetal vertigo. As such, CRISTAUX is a real descent into an inner labyrinth, which we do not know if it is organic or cultural. At the same time, the film contains a dialectical break that initiates other semantic directions in Hernandez’s work. Under the influence of Michel Nedjar, the filmmaker abandons his traditional method of editing based on rushes. The operation is now completed inside the camera, filming. This more flexible way of proceeding (“the camera must become a second eye”) is already reflected in the clear openings of Lacrima Christi: the Christian myth seems to be on the way to exorcising. The pantheistic intoxication – close to that evoked by Nietzsche – seizes places, objects and participants.
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A cleverly composed, prefiguring episode in Three Lives and Only One Death shows Mateo Strano (Marcello Mastroianni) in simultaneous, tripartite images (in a similar vein as Alain Resnais’ Last Year at Marienbad and Lina Wertmüller’s Love and Anarchy) through mirrors and split-screening as he continues to awkwardly fidget with his necktie even after a secondary point-of-view shot indicates that he has already placed his hands on the dinner table while waiting for his wife, Maria (Marisa Paredes) to return to the room.Read More »

In an industrial zone of the city of Nice, Jihad is starting a factory making ready meals. His employers Fahid, Toufik, Madanni, Marouan and Gisèle share different tasks and struggle to keep the “Coûte que Coûte” company in business.Read More »

A witty and eye-opening tour through Borowczyk’s own collection of vintage erotica. Originally intended as part of his ‘Contes immoraux’ , it was released first as a separate short, and is therefore marks the turning-point between Borowczyk’s career as a highly-regarded animator and surrealist filmmaker, and his subsequent career in the sexploitation field.Read More »

Synopsis:
With the natural splendour of Lac Léman as a back-drop, Le Mirage is the story of a woman who believes she can recapture her youth by rediscovering love… with no regard for the inescapable realities of life. Maria Tummler, still quite beautiful despite her fifty years, is suddenly possessed with a consuming passion for a young visiting American, a friend of her son. But neither Jeanne, her friend, nor Anna, her daughter and faithful confidante, have a right to know, even though the young girl can see the emotion in her mother’s eyes and is delighted to witness the physical transformation seemingly taking place. Maria is prepared to live this miracle of resuscitated love to its very end, even as some signs of a strange physical weariness begin to invade her new-found sense of well-being.Read More »

TCM Review :
The story behind Abel Gance’s Napoleon (1927) is as exciting as the film. A masterpiece adventure originally running nearly seven hours, it breaks new ground with practically every shot, was filmed with techniques twenty-five years ahead of its time, and was rescued from oblivion by an obsessed teenager.Read More »

Continuing its exploration of the weirdest moments of cinema, Cult Epics brings us Vintage Erotica anno 1940 (aka Les Archives d’Eden), a collection of French porn vignettes covering the early years of celluloid sex from 1900 to 1940.Read More »

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It is an outstanding film that sees Feuillade experimenting with this new cinematic genre that will lead to his classics, Fantomas, Les Vampires and Judex. The film is also notable for its introduction of the actor René Navarre, who plays detective Julien Kieffer and will go on to play Fantomas.

Le trust, ou les batailles de l’argent has a most unusual plot. The film involves the detective Julien Kieffer helping the industrialist Jacob Berwick spy on his rival Darbois in order to steal Darbois’ discovery of a formula to manufacture artificial rubber. This is the earliest example of a film that is based around corporate espionage; surprisingly, the film transcends its plot and proves to be compelling viewing.Read More »