Patrice Leconte
When the silent cinema learned to speak, the audience was surprised not only by the voices of the actors and the sound effects, but also by a new element, the music, which, combined with the dance and an unprejudiced imagination, gave rise to a new genre, as important to Hollywood cinema as the western was: the musical. A journey through the history of this genre, from its beginnings to the present day.
A documentary about the making of Walerian Borowczyk's 'Blanche'.
Michel, who's crazy about jazz, has just found a rare album that he dreams of quietly listening to in his living room. But the world seems to have conspired against him: his wife chooses this moment to divulge an ill-timed revelation, his adult son makes a surprise visit, one of his friends knocks on the door, while his mother keeps calling him on his smartphone. Not to mention that today the residents in his apartment building are holding their annual House Party. Manipulative and a liar, Michel is ready to do anything to have a moment of peace and quiet. Is it still possible, in this day and age, to just have one hour of peace?
Stéphane Goudet is all over the Tati box-set as the preeminent Tati scholar, so it is only fitting that he conclude the disc with a half hour lecture that concludes the themes and methods of the filmmaker.
In a cold French city where suicide is a common urge, there is a colorful shop, managed for many years by the Tuvache family, where it is very easy to obtain the necessary tools to satisfy the sinister desires of so many depressed citizens.
Two brothers live in Montbard, Burgundy. For their summer vacation, they decide to visit their mother in Saint-Jean-de-Luz, because it’s been a long time, because it would make her happy… There’s no shortage of reasons. They buy a second-hand motor home and plan to stay open to whatever the road brings them, embarking on a brothers’ journey across France. Just the two of them. But then an endearing young woman crosses their path...
A short program in which the participants describe how they fell in love with cinema.
After the Club Med and skiing, what happened to the Bronzés 27 years later? Early response: the same, and worse.
Catherine refuses to believe that her business partner, the unlikeable François, has a best friend, so she challenges him to set up an introduction. Scrambling to find someone willing to pose as his best pal, François enlists the services of a charming taxi driver to play the part.
A collection of short films by 16 European directors.
Because she picked the wrong door, Anna ends up confessing her marriage problems to a financial adviser named William Faber. Touched by her distress, somewhat excited as well, Faber does not have the courage to tell her that he is not a psychiatrist. From appointment to appointment, a strange ritual is created between them. William is moved and fascinated to hear the secrets no man ever heard.
Director Patrice Leconte weaves an impressionistic, sensorial tapestry of existence in and around early 21st-century Cambodia. Journeying through the country's farmlands, factories, streets and rural villages, camera-in-hand, Leconte glimpses the people and the elements of the landscape that make Cambodia so culturally specific, and gently contrasts modes of life found there. Written by Nathan Southern
A handyman in a 1940s Paris brothel tries to help the prostitute he loves with her singing career and romantic life.
A man, Milan (played by Johnny Hallyday) steps off a train, into a small French village. As he waits for the day when he will rob the town bank, he runs into an old retired poetry teacher named M. Manesquier (Jean Rochefort). The two men strike up a strange friendship and explore the road not taken, each wanting to live the other's life.
Félix, operator of dodgem cars in a fairground, becomes obsessed by one of his customers, a mysterious young woman named Lola. Félix soon discovers that Lola is running away from her former boyfriend, a singer who continues to taunt her. Lola asks Félix to prove his love for her by murdering a man he does not know...
In 1850, on the isolated French island of Saint-Pierre, a murder shocks the natives. Two fishermen are arrested. One of them, Louis Ollivier, dies in custody. The other, Neel Auguste, is sentenced to death by the guillotine. The island is so small that it has neither a guillotine nor an executioner. While those are sent for Auguste is placed under the supervision of army Captain.
It's night on a Paris bridge. A girl leans over Seine River with tears in her eyes and a violent yearning to drown her sorrows. Out of nowhere someone takes an interest in her. He is Gabor, a knife thrower who needs a human target for his show. The girl, Adele, has never been lucky and nowhere else to go. So she follows him. They travel along the northern bank of the Mediterranean to perform.
Alice Tomaso gets out of jail, and goes looking for Léo and Julien, one of whom, it appears, is her father. On the way, she steals the wrong car - one belonging to the Russian mafia, and arrives at her destination with a gang of thugs out looking for her and the car.
Three aging and failed comedians, Georges Cox, Victor Vialat and Eddie Carpentier, hit the road again with a lousy production of a lousy play, of course under the worst possible conditions.
40 international directors were asked to make a short film using the original Cinematographe invented by the Lumière Brothers, working under conditions similar to those of 1895. There were three rules: (1) The film could be no longer than 52 seconds, (2) no synchronized sound was permitted, and (3) no more than three takes. The results run the gamut from Zhang Yimou's convention-thwarting joke to David Lynch's bizarre miniature epic.
You're a provincial kid in Paris and suddenly you're the center of attention: Movie stars, famous directors and sexy women are doting on you because they all think you're the son of their long-dead legendary friend. You never knew your dad, but the facts of this famous guy's life suggest that he might have fathered you. Your mom tells you nothing. All the fuss makes you uncomfortable at first but soon you find it's rather fun to be the son of the famous Gascogne. And in the midst of it all you fall in love. It is, after all, springtime in Paris.
It is the summer of 1958 in wealthy Lake Geneva, where an enigmatic young Frenchman begins an affair with a beautiful starlet under the watchful eye of her flamboyant elderly mentor. But in a season full of secrets, is truth the most elusive passion of all?
Vincent, a stunt pilot, is acquitted of murdering his wife and her lover. However, a few years later, L'Elegant, the Judge in the case, comes to blackmail him. The Judge's nephew, Paul, is having trouble with his wife and they demand that Vincent kill her. The Judge, a confirmed bachelor, takes Paul and Vincent on the road to search for Paul's wife Marie. The three men get on well together, and spend their time discussing their relationship with women.
Probably no one in the public listening to the orchestra's rendition of Ravel's Bolero notices him but the drummer is a regular hero. For, although his mind is assailed by loads of unsettling thoughts and worries, he tries to keep the rhythm at any cost. He knows all too well that he falls out of time only once all the magic of the piece will vanish.
A collection of European T.V. commercials directed by a variety of well-known directors from across Europe and the U.S. Compiled and produced by Jean-Marie Boursicot.
Contre l'Oubli (Against Oblivion) is a compilation of 30 French filmmakers, Alain Resnais and Jean Luc Godard among them, who use film to make a plea on behalf of a political prisoner. Jean Luc Godard and Anne Marie Mieville's film concerns the plight of Thomas Wanggai, West Papuan activist who has since died in prison. The short films were commissioned by Amnesty International.
The film begins in a flashback from the titular character, Antoine. We are introduced to his fixation with female hairdressers which began at a young age. The film uses flashbacks throughout and there are frequent parallels drawn with the past. We are unsure what Antoine has done with his life, however we know he has fulfilled his childhood ambition, to marry a haidresser.
A French man spies on a lovely younger woman across the way. When he's spotted by the woman shortly after being questioned by the police about a local murder, the man's simple life becomes more complicated.
Michel Mortez travels around France hosting a radio game show he created 25 years ago. He is famous among the average Frenchmen. Rivetot, his assistant and technician, always goes with him. He is the only one who knows what really lies under Mortez's appearance of a playful don Juan. When the program is canceled, Rivetot delays telling Mortez as long as possible... Both malicious and tender, this bitter comedy also shows nostalgia.
While being transferred to another prison, two convicts - Stéphane Carella and Paul Brandon - effect a miraculous escape. They are pursued across the Verdon Gorge before arriving at an isolated farmhouse whose owner, Laura, offers them sanctuary. Since the death of her husband, Laura has longed to get her own back on the police and she agrees to help Carella and Brandon in their scheme to rob a casino in Nice. After a shoot out with the casino’s owners, Carella realises that not everything is what it seems. Brandon is not what he appears...
En voulant aider Marylou à sortir de la délinquance, Pinot, simple flic, va se retrouver confronté à Tony, son compagnon, un dealer.
Inspector Leroux is investigating the owner of a contemporary art gallery Helen Duvernet who is suspected of being involved in trafficking of stolen paintings. He is both intrigued and attracted by the young woman, follows her everywhere and finally falls in love...
Abandoned by his wife, Bernard struggles to overcome his grief and settles in a residence for singles. Employed by "SOS Doctors", he provides night guards to occupy his insomnia. That's how he is brought one night to help a neighbor, Nadine Foulon, victim of discomfort in the elevator. It turns out that Nadine is also going through a difficult time, since her companion, Terry, a singer-guitarist, has left her. A professional photographer, she can not forget it and has since oscillated between depression and bulimia. Gathered by their pains of heart, these two beings will, with the wire of the confidences, become more intimate ...
In this sequel to Les Bronzes (1978) summer has passed, but that doesn't mean the fun has to end for Bernard, Nathalie, Gigi, Jerome, Popeye, Jean-Claude, and Christiane.
Holidaymakers arriving in a Club Med camp on the Ivory Coast are determined to forget their everyday problems and emotional disappointments. Games, competitions, outings, bathing and sunburn accompany a continual succession of casual affairs.
A bus conductor gets dressed for work in the morning, goes to the toilet, where he is killed by a bomb. The Commissioner and his fat, bumbling assistant, Inspector Charbonnier are put on the case. After interviewing friends, wives, colleagues, and spying on strangers who might be connected, our heroes trace the assassin down to a mental institution where, it seems, the murder victim has been an inmate for the last three years...
Portrait of comic book artist Marcel Gotlib.
All the researchers of the IMPS laboratory are males - with one exception : Mademoiselle Clara, Antoine, the cleaner, desperately yearns for. Night after night, when Clara is alone, going on with her experiments, the young man awkwardly manoeuvres with a view to declaring his flame. But the cold scientist remains unconcerned. In his trouble, Antoine regularly drops and breaks phials and other test tubes full of dangerous chemical products. He doesn't care when his skin gets into contact with acid. His heart burns too much for him to be able to feel the burning of his skin. And if he can't GIVE his hand to Clara will he really mind to... LOSE it ?
Tintin and Captain Haddock are walking through the countryside of Marlinspike when they come across a Romani community camped in a garbage dump, and reunite a lost little girl named Miarka with her family there. The Romani explain that they are not allowed to camp anywhere else so Haddock invites them to the grounds of his estate, Marlinspike Hall.
