France

Synopsis / Review from CINEUROPA:

With only four feature films to her name over the past 30 years and a propensity to always go where you don’t expect, from the rural drama of Peaux de vaches (discovered in the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes in 1989) to high-level horse riding in Of Women and Horses [+] (screened on the Piazza Grande at Locarno in 2011) and Mme de Maintenon’s ruthless gynaecium at the end of the seventeenth century in The King’s Daughters (also screened in the Un Certain Regard section in 2000 and nominated for a César Award for Best Film). Read More »

From rogerebert.com

Claude Sautet makes movies the way people live – he traces the connections between the mistakes, and celebrates the occasional victories. His movies aren’t tightly plotted, and we never have the feeling that his characters are doing something because the screenplay says they must. Sautet’s people take their chances like the rest of us.Read More »

In his first screen role, Tom Mercier plays Yoav, a disaffected young Israeli who flees Tel Aviv for Paris to start a new life. Desperate to erase his origins, Yoav sees becoming French as his only hope for salvation. He constantly consults his dictionary in an effort to stop speaking Hebrew, but finds working at the Israeli embassy is a distraction. Preparing for the French naturalisation test also has its pitfalls, while the young couple he befriends have some strange ideas about how to help him. Based on writer-director Nadav Lapid’s own experiences, Synonymes explores the challenges of putting down roots in a new place, as Yoav’s attempts to find himself awaken past demons and open up an existential abyss…Read More »

A factory worker lives in a small house and does her shopping at the local store. One morning as she’s getting ready for work, she learns that the factory, which is the center of her universe, is about to move and disappear from sight.Read More »

Synopsis:
Ange leaves New York to fly to his native Corsica. His mother is dying and Ange, who was not present when his father died, wishes to be present at her death. In Corsica Ange finds his brother Baptiste who married Maria, the woman he loved. He finds out that his father was killed, but nobody wants to tell him the name of the killer. And finally he finds two killers expecting him.Read More »

When Ella meets Abel, her life changes. In the wake of this elusive lover, the girl will discover the cosmopolitan Paris and underground gaming circles, where adrenaline and money reign. First a bet, their story is transformed into a devouring passion.Read More »

Marseilles, 1919. Georges Sarret is a distinguished and respected lawyer, recently honoured for his services in the First World War. He takes as his lover Philomène Schmidt, a young German woman, who has just lost her job and home. To enable Philomène to remain in France, Georges finds her a husband – who dies conveniently of natural causes a month after the wedding. Georges repeats the trick with Philomène’s sister, Catherine – marrying her off to an old man who dies suddenly so that the scheming trio can profit from his life insurance. When an accomplice in the scheme, Marcel Chambon, threatens to blackmail them, Georges and his two lovers have no option but to kill him and his mistress…Read More »

Synopsis:
After murdering his mistress and being hunted by the authorities in France, Pierre (Jean Gabin) stows away aboard a ship bound for Genoa, Italy. Though he’s immediately robbed after arriving, things look up for Pierre when he meets Cecchina (Vera Talchi), a kind-hearted young girl who introduces him to her mother, Marta (Isa Miranda). Pierre and Marta fall in love, but the French police are closing in on him and the new couple may not have much time left.Read More »

A film thought to be lost until 5 reels (out of 9) were found in the UCLA archives. It was derived from an eponymous play by Marcel Achard which allowed to reconstruct he synopsis. Jean Gabin is the captain of the Cormorant, a horse-drawn barge, living happily along the canals with his sister Mique and Sylvestre (Pierre Blanchar), his fellow mariner and friend. The film starts with Gabin rescuing a young lady named Marinette (Madeleine Renaud) who had fallen in the canal for unsaid reason. Gabin soon also falls (for her), they get married and the boat is renamed ‘la Belle Marinière’ (the handsome she-mariner). During the wedding party returns Sylvestre (a handsome he-mariner) who had been away for the necessities of the script. He will now be the object of a growing interest from Marinette which results in the expected confict between the two men.Read More »