French

  • Marcel Hanoun – L’automne (1972)

    Marcel Hanoun1971-1980ArthouseExperimentalFrance

    Synopsis: Julien, a movie director, is on the phase of editing his new film, “Juliette sacrifiée”. Hurried by his producer, he asks for the help of a professional editor. It is Anne, with whom Julien is soon falling in love. During the whole of the movie, both are sitting in front of the editing table, where they listen to music, talk about politics and what movies should and should not be about, make love, and finally end up editing the film as was planned.Read More »

  • Hafsia Herzi – Bonne Mère AKA Good Mother (2021)

    2021-2030DramaFranceHafsia Herzi

    An instantly involving portrait of a fifty-something woman in contemporary Marseille diligently holding together several generations, Good Mother establishes actor turned writer/director Hafsia Herzi as a significant French filmmaker. Nora, a cleaning lady in her fifties, looks after her family in a housing estate in the northern part of Marseille. She is worried about her grandson Ellyes, who has been in prison for several months for robbery and is awaiting his trial with a mixture of hope and anxiety. Nora does everything she can to make this wait as painless as possible.Read More »

  • Alain Resnais – Muriel ou Le temps d’un retour AKA Muriel, or The Time of Return (1963)

    Alain Resnais1961-1970Amos Vogel: Film as a Subversive ArtArthouseDramaFrance

    Synopsis:
    Seyrig is a fortyish widow dealing antique furniture from her apartment, who invites an old flame she hasn’t seen since the Algerian war to visit her and her troubled eccentric filmmaker stepson (Thierre), whom she shares an apartment with in Boulogne (a city in the provinces). The stepson is a recent veteran of the Algerian war who can’t escape the memory of a young girl named Muriel he tortured and killed during the war, as he watches grainy 8mm film clips of newsreels which remind him of the Arab girl.Read More »

  • Mikhaël Hers – Amanda (2018)

    2011-2020DramaFranceMikhaël Hers

    David, who gets by doing odd jobs, meets Lena, who has just moved up to Paris, and falls in love. But soon after, his life is brutally interrupted by the sudden death of his sister. Beyond the shock, and the pain, David now finds himself alone with his young niece Amanda to care for.Read More »

  • José Giovanni – Un aller simple AKA One Way Ticket (1971)

    José Giovanni1971-1980CrimeDramaFrance

    A small-time criminal wants to give up his life of crime. He performs a robbery with a friend, with similar feelings, and things go sour.Read More »

  • Jean Eustache – Une sale histoire AKA A Dirty Story (1977)

    Jean Eustache1971-1980DramaFrance

    Quote:
    A group of friends listen as one man tells them a story about a time when, in a small cafe, he discovered a peephole into the ladies’ bathroom and became addicted to looking through it at female genitals. They ask him questions and come to conclusions about sex. This is a filmed, scripted version. Then, the actual person who this happened to relates the same story; this time, however, it is an unscripted documentary, in which the same things occur as in the scripted one.Read More »

  • Olivier Assayas – Noise (2006)

    Olivier Assayas2001-2010DocumentaryFrancePerformance

    Quote:
    Abstract documentary account of the 2005 Festival Art Rock in Saint-Brieuc, France, featuring performances by Sonic Youth, Metric and others.

    Performances by:
    MIRROR/DASH (kim gordon – thurston moore)
    JEANNE BALIBAR/RODOLPHE BURGER
    METRIC
    TEXT OF LIGHT (lee ranaldo – steve shelley)
    AFEL BOCOUM
    MARIE MODIANO
    ALLA
    WHITE TAHINA (joanna preiss – vincent epplay)
    PASCAL RAMBERT
    JIM O’ROURKERead More »

  • Alain Corneau – Le cousin (1997)

    Alain Corneau1991-2000DramaFranceThriller

    From IMDB:
    Nounours is the nickname of a “cousin” an informer with a special arrangement with the police: he gets 10% of the drugs seized thanks to his help. When his personal contact, inspector Maurin, commits suicide, inspector Gérard Delvaux takes over. Meanwhile, judge Lambert is uncovering the illegal practices of the policemen. Her persistent investigations, which had cornered Maurin, are leading to Gérard, and also to Nounours as the source of heroin that led to recent cases of deadly overdoses. Nounours promises Gérard increasingly bigger catches which he is intent on realising before he is forced to reveal who Nounours is to judge Lambert. Written by Eduardo CasaisRead More »

  • Marcel Hanoun – L’été (1968)

    Marcel Hanoun1961-1970ArthouseExperimentalFranceThe Films of May '68

    Quote:
    After the event of May1968, a young woman shelters in the country, in a house where she waits for her partner.

    Quote:
    “…‘Who creates? And for whom?’ What is important is that Hanoun does not answer these questions in a grandiloquent way. On the contrary, far from showing a series of dramatic actions, he focuses on the in-between moments in the life of his beautiful young protagonist. He plays with fragments of the scene, reframing the image, using frames (doors, windows, a mirror as a tableau vivant) and all of this confronts the viewer with a sort of catalog of repetitive acts, where drama and character development are absent.Read More »

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