France

In The Trilogy, three different but parallel stories unfold revealing the lives of a husband and wife, a policeman and his drug-addicted wife, and a prison escapee and his friends. The characters wander in and out of three films where we see them switch from leading men and women to supporting actors. The three films, all of different genres (the first is a thriller, the second a comedy and the third a melodrama), provide the same action from different angles and perspectives. Each film can be appreciated on its own, but together they form a cohesive whole allowing the viewer to gain a deeper understanding of the characters. Although it is reminiscent of Kurosawa’s Rashomon and Balzac’s novels, Lucas Belvaux’s project is unprecedented.Read More »

In The Trilogy, three different but parallel stories unfold revealing the lives of a husband and wife, a policeman and his drug-addicted wife, and a prison escapee and his friends. The characters wander in and out of three films where we see them switch from leading men and women to supporting actors. The three films, all of different genres (the first is a thriller, the second a comedy and the third a melodrama), provide the same action from different angles and perspectives. Each film can be appreciated on its own, but together they form a cohesive whole allowing the viewer to gain a deeper understanding of the characters. Although it is reminiscent of Kurosawa’s Rashomon and Balzac’s novels, Lucas Belvaux’s project is unprecedented.Read More »

In The Trilogy, three different but parallel stories unfold revealing the lives of a husband and wife, a policeman and his drug-addicted wife, and a prison escapee and his friends. The characters wander in and out of three films where we see them switch from leading men and women to supporting actors. The three films, all of different genres (the first is a thriller, the second a comedy and the third a melodrama), provide the same action from different angles and perspectives. Each film can be appreciated on its own, but together they form a cohesive whole allowing the viewer to gain a deeper understanding of the characters. Although it is reminiscent of Kurosawa’s Rashomon and Balzac’s novels, Lucas Belvaux’s project is unprecedented.Read More »

Ballet Mécanique (1923–24) is a Dadaist post-Cubist art film conceived, written, and co-directed by the artist Fernand Léger in collaboration with the filmmaker Dudley Murphy (with cinematographic input from Man Ray).[1] The film premiered in a silent version on 24 September 1924 at the Internationale Ausstellung neuer Theatertechnik (International Exposition for New Theater Technique) in Vienna presented by Frederick Kiesler. It is considered one of the masterpieces of early experimental filmmaking.Read More »

Brisbane, Australia, late 1910s. A man on the run from a murder charge buys a place as a stowaway on a smuggler ship bound for Mexico, by way of a tiny coral reef atoll.

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Between 1923 and 1952 Maurice Gleize managed to direct twenty two films in France without distinguishing himself. This one, with a screenplay by top French scriptwriter Charles Spaak, had arguably the best cast he ever got to work with (on other occasions he directed Fenandel, Charles Vanel and Marie Bell) from co-stars Jean Gabin and Michele Morgan – hot on the heels of Quai des brumes that same year – to Saturnin Fabre, Gaston Modot and Julien Carrette but for all Gleize extracted from them it might as well have been John Lund and Maria Montez supported by Leo Gorcey and the Bowery Boys.Read More »

Plot: The story takes place in the 1920s. William, a young aristocrat, has just won a property in Chili, near Santiago, in a poker game. He takes his wife Anne-Marie there so that she can rest. Right from the moment they arrive, they are welcomed by strange and intrusive characters bound together by an oppressive and poetical figure, the ghost of Léonor, who died accidentally. The house, with its suffocating presence, becomes the theater of an incredible substitution linked to the anxieties and desires of an unsatisfied man. (uniFrance)Read More »

Mannequin hands hold a pair of dice. A castle is perched on a hilltop. Below it, a posh, modern villa. Meanwhile, far from Paris, two men with masked faces play dice in a bar. They decide to drive to Paris. Country roads, hills, fences. The posh “chateau” appears again: meticulous garden, fancy interior, odd sculptures. And at home? “No one, NO ONE.” For the next two days, masked figures play dice, frolic by the pool, perform exercises with a ball. Two new figures arrive. Masked. They search and find the dice. They dance. Mannequin hands hold a pair of dice.Read More »

A Parisian experimenter with Lumiere’s Kinematograph (Charles Denner) dies in WW1, and his son (Charles Denner) grows to be a man who barely survives WW2 in a concentration camp. He marries another refugee (Marthe Keller) who dies in childbirth, leaving him a daugher, Sarah, who at age 16 (Marthe Keller) is a spoiled debutante hopelessly in love with pop singer Gilbert Bécaud (Gilbert Bécaud) she goes through the 60s trying every fad while her father wishes she’d settle down. Meanwhile, sneak thief Simon Duroc (André Dussollier) winds up in prison, where he slowly turns his devious energies to their least-antisocial use: filmmaking.Read More »

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This French anthology is a tribute to A Propos de Nice (1930), a classic documentary that took a poetic and sometimes satirical look at life in the French Riviera town. This version blends fact and fiction to chronicle life in modern-day Nice and is comprised of seven vignettes, each directed by an internationally renowned filmmaker. Only one of the episodes, “Reperages,” from Iranian directors Abbas Kiarostami and Parviz Kimiavi, stays close to the style of the original film by Jean Vigo as it chronicles the experiences of a filmmaker who came to Nice to do research on Vigo for his upcoming documentary. Read More »