French

Quote:
Following a death, a young woman returns to her island of birth, Corsica. She finds herself in a nationalist male world in the impressive and desolate landscape around Cap Corse. The story in this film without dialogue by the artist Ange Leccia is driven by songs such as Ne dis rien by Serge Gainsbourg. A young woman, Antonia, returns to her island of birth, Corsica, after one of her relatives has disappeared at sea. She is torn back and forth between her old love Ettore and the dumb Alexander. The quest for Antonia’s place in the masculine environment of armed nationalism is an excuse for all kinds of peregrinations in the spectacular landscape of Cap Corse – a landscape that itself becomes a leading character. The plot of this fascinating film, entirely without dialogue, is told in songs such as Ne dis rien by Serge Gainsbourg. With the songs, the maker reveals the psychology of his characters, who seem to be in the grip of an age-old, atavistic melancholy.Read More »

Synopsis:
‘Francois Leclerc returns to his home, an industrial town in northern France, after serving a seven year prison sentence for a murder he did not commit. He recalls the events which led up to his trial, beginning with his romance with Gilberte Liegeard, daughter of a powerful industrialist, and the spectacular opportunities for social climbing this offered him.Before his fall from grace, Leclerc was a popular figure, managing an exclusive night club. But he had some dangerous enemies, who implicated him in a double murder. Seven years on, Leclerc is determined to have his revenge…’

– Films de FranceRead More »

Jean-Marie Straub pushes this musicality of blocks to a paroxysmal extreme, mixing blocks of time (40 years separate the various extracts that are going to be used, and what is to be filmed), blocks of text (Malraux, Fortini, Vittorini, Hölderlin) and blocks of language (French, Italian, German), and from this ruckus emerges the history of the world, yes, History with a capital H, and from the same movement, the political hope of its being overtaken. So this is an adventure film, about the Human adventure, still one that is always, in the end, overtaken by Nature.Read More »

A middle-aged political activist tries to dissuade his young followers from taking radical action.Read More »

STORYLINE:
In 1914, World War I, the bloodiest war ever at that time in human history, was well under way. However on Christmas Eve, numerous sections of the Western Front called an informal, and unauthorized, truce where the various front-line soldiers of the conflict peacefully met each other in No Man’s Land to share a precious pause in the carnage with a fleeting brotherhood. This film dramatizes one such section as the French, Scottish and German sides partake in the unique event, even though they are aware that their superiors will not tolerate its occurrence.Read More »

A handful of strangers hoping to find freedom discover it is no easy quarry in this metaphoric drama. Four people stand near the shore of a seaside community and board a small boat hoping to sail away; they are soon attacked by border guards, and one of them does not survive. The three remaining sailors — two men (Axel Neuman and Valentinas Masalskis) and a woman (Fatima Ennafloui) — wash up on the beach of an island strewn with rocks. None of them speak the same language, and they struggle to make their way on the unforgiving coastline, often at odds with each other. They find they are not alone on the island — an Arab settlement and a cadre of soldiers are already living there; the military men attack them, and the Arabs refuse to come to their aid. Freedom was shown in competition at the 2000 Venice Film Festival. (by Mark Deming,)

Runaway drug dealers and a lost girl travel through a desert and along the coast. This journey reveals the complicated relationships between people, their striving for freedom to be lonely.
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Lithuanian Film Center Home PageRead More »

Synopsis:
‘Tom Ripley and Philippe Greenleaf are lately inseparable friends. They’re both idling in Europe, but on papa Greenleaf’s dime. Philippe’s fiancee Marge feels sorry for Tom but resents his presence, while Philippe’s other friend, Freddie, considers Tom Ripley a worthless moocher. But there’s more to Tom Ripley, the mimic, the forger, the talented criminal improviser, than anyone, even Tom Ripley himself, can guess.’
– J. Spurlin (IMDb)Read More »

Quote:
It is an odd film: the central relationship between Joseph and Célestine is not entirely plausible, even as a desperate amour fou. But it is well acted and confidently performed. The antisemitism is a key to the film’s oppressive atmosphere. The pale, pinched neatness and pleasantness of this bourgeois household conceal a secret poison sac into which all the evil is drained: Vincent’s horrible leaflets, which express what so many respectable folk are thinking. This is a minor, flawed movie, but watchable in its suppressed, pornographic melodrama. –The GuardianRead More »

LES PAYS LOIN was Jean Rollin’s second short film. It was never screened in the cinema-or even film festivals- until years after it was made and, even then, on extremely rare occasions. This Encore release is the first opportunity that almost anyone has had to see this early work. The film is a science fiction piece in which a man and a woman are lost in a maze of streets and can’t remember how they got there. When they do make it out onto the busy, populated streets, things are no better. The landmarks are unfamiliar and the people speak a strange language. Even at this very early stage, one can already see the themes of loneliness and melancholy, and a yearning for release that are trademarks of Rollin characters throughout his entire body of work.Read More »