CHIN UP!
(HAUT LES COEURS! ) FRANCE 2000
Cast: Karin Viard Laurent Lucas Julien Cottereau Philippe Duclos
Director: Solveig Anspach
Running time: 113 minutes
For Emma, the good news is she’s pregnant. A professional musician, Emma has wanted a child for some time, though her boyfriend Simon seems less excited about fatherhood. The bad news, however, is that Emma soon learns she has breast cancer. She faces a complicated series of health options. Sensitive and intelligent direction ensures that the film never gets bogged down in heavy sentiment. Viard received praise at the Cannes Film Festival.
THE CRIMSON RIVERS
(LES RIVIERES POURPRES) FRANCE 2000
Cast: Vincent Cassel Jean Reno Nadia Fares Jean-Pierre Cassel
Director: Mathieu Kassovitz
Running time: 103 minutes
This is a dark intellectual thriller, set against breathtaking views of the Alps, in which two very different policemen are led to the same isolated university town to solve a series of brutal murders. Pierre Niemans is a special homicide expert who is called in when a horribly mutilated corpse is found. Then the grave of a young girl is desecrated and a young detective, Max Kerkerian, is assigned to the case — what emerges is a dark secret. A thoroughly engrossing film.
A QUESTION OF TASTE
(UNE AFFAIRE DE GOUT) FRANCE 2000
Cast: Bernard Giraudeau Jean-Pierre Lorit Florence Thomassin
Director: Bernard Rapp
Running time: 91 minutes
Based on the novel by Philippe Balland, this is an offbeat psychological drama from director Bernard Rapp. The French take their food seriously and a young waiter, Nicolas, is about to discover that good taste can be dangerous as well as educational. He lives a Bohemian life in a small flat he shares with his girlfriend, Beatrice, and three of his friends. One night a customer asks Nicholas to taste his hors d’oeuvre and see if he can identify the ingredients. When he proves correct, the wealthy businessman hires him as his official food taster, along with a healthy salary. This fascinating film received four nominations from the French Academy of Cinema.
THE DOUBLE LIFE OF VERONIQUE FRANCE/POLAND 1991
Cast: Irene Jacob Wladyslaw Kowalski Guillame de Tonquedec
Director: Krzysztof Kieslowski
Running time: 96 minutes
Those familiar with Kieslowski’s Three Colours trilogy will recognise his fascination with accidental happenings and chance encounters. This film is the story of two young women who are, in some mysterious way, the same woman leading two very different yet interconnected lives. Veronika and Veronique are born on the same day in the same year — one in Poland and the other in France. Veronika, like Veronique, grows up to be a talented vocalist. During a concert, while singing a duet, Veronika loses consciousness and dies. The film charts the effect this death has on Veronique. Irene Jacob won best actress at Cannes for her performance and the film itself won both the Ecumenical Award and the International Critics Prize at the same Festival.
AND GOD CREATED WOMAN
(ET DIEU CREA LA FEMME) FRANCE 1956
Cast: Brigitte Bardot Curd Jurgens Jean-Louis Trintignant
Director: Roger Vadim
Running time: 95 minutes
Here’s the original film that turned legendary French sex symbol Brigitte Bardot into an international sensation and gave its director Roger Vadim instant cult status. It caused a bigger stir upon initial release in the United States than Bertolucci’s Last Tango In Paris did 15 years later. Juliette (Bardot) is an 18-year-old orphan and known in St Tropez as someone more than comfortable with her sexuality. At first she flirts with a manipulative land baron (Curd Jurgens), then hones in on the nasty Anton (Christian Marquand) and finally settles for Antoine’s sweet younger brother Michel (Jean-Louis Trintignant). The film represented a breakthrough in the portrayal of female sexuality.
GOOD WORK
(BEAU TRAVAIL) FRANCE 1999
Cast: Denis Lavant Michel Subor Gregoire Colin
Director: Claire Denis
Running time: 90 minutes
Loosely based on Herman Melville’s novel Billy Budd, Sailor, this powerful military drama is set in a French Foreign Legion outpost in the Gulf of Dijbouti. Galoup is an officer who enjoys a close relationship with the commanding officer and works with a team of fit young men who work hard all day and play hard all night. A new recruit, Sentain, joins the troops and immediately becomes popular with his comrades because of his good humour and selfless nature. These virtues make him the new favourite of the officer. Denis’s beautiful film is a homoerotic look at the French empire’s estrangement from its distant past.
MY LITTLE BUSINESS
(MA PETITE ENTREPRISE) FRANCE 1999
Cast: Vincent Lindon Francois Berleand Roschdy Zem Zabou
Director: Pierre Jolivet
Running time: 89 minutes
Ivan runs a woodwork factory founded by his grandfather. He has only a handful of faithful employees and is supported by a devoted clientele. One afternoon the building burns down mysteriously and Ivan finds himself unwittingly involved in an insurance fraud scheme. This is French comedy at its finest and the film collected six nominations, including best actor (Vincent Lindon), from the French Academy of Cinema.
AUGUSTIN: KING OF KUNG-FU
(AUGUSTIN ROI DU KUNG-FU) FRANCE/SPAIN 1999
Cast: Jean-Chretien Sibertin-Blanc Maggie Cheung
Director: Anne Fontaine
Running time: 90 minutes
Acclaimed director Anne Fontaine has come up with an oddball comedy about an untalented bit-part actor who yearns to be a kung-fu star. Augustin works as a movie extra by day and at night he practises his favourite passion, kung fu. Everything he has learnt about the martial arts, he has gleaned from watching movies from the 1970s. He rents a room at a shabby hotel, lands a job at a Chinese curio shop and enrolls for martial arts classes. He meets Ms Ling, a sexy acupuncturist and suddenly his life takes off in a different direction.
SADE FRANCE 2000
Cast: Daniel Auteuil Marianne Denicourt Gregoire Colin
Director: Benoit Jacquot
Running time: 97 minutes
The year is 1794 and the infamous Marquis de Sade is serving a sentence in Paris’s grim Saint Lazarde prison. France’s revolutionary leader, Robespierre, is persecuting the marquis for his unshakeable atheist beliefs. He is transferred to more lenient incarceration at Picpus, a former convent, and fixes his attention on Sensible, a fresh-faced young virgin. The script will have us believe that Sade was more a philosopher and rebel against society than a pornographer. The sumptuous period sets and costumes seem to be a stronger guiding principle in the film than the triumph of Sadian instinct over Robespierrian ideals.
EMPTY DAYS
(RIEN A FAIRE) FRANCE 1999
Cast: Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi Patrick Dell’Isola Sergi Lopez
Director: Marion Vernoux
Running time: 103 minutes
Jobless for more than 14 months, Marie meets the recently unemployed Pierre in a local supermarket. Both married, they form a tentative friendship and their meetings fill the endless hours between job hunting. They become lovers, neither wanting their spouses to know. The relationship has less to do with love than with a need to fill the empty hours of the day, to restore self-esteem. Marion Vernoux’s film is an intriguing work with a strong socio-economic slant, observing the demoralising effects of unemployment.
ROSINE FRANCE 1994
Cast: Eloise Charretier Laurent Olmedo Mathilde Seigner
Director: Christine Carriere
Running time: 102 minutes
Almost like a metaphor, the cold continual rain in Northern France is like the lack of affection the 14-year old Rosine receives from her mother. Marie gave birth to Rosine when she was only 16 and now wants little to do with the girl. She prefers to spend her time out on the town at night, while her young daughter is obsessed with getting affection from her. Out of the blue Rosine’s father, Pierre, shows up and her mother is only too eager to have him back. The gloomy tranquillity in Rosine’s life iis soon shattered when her mother is beaten and Rosine raped. This powerful drama about child abuse won the Bronze Leopard at the Locarno Film Festival.
SACH’S DISEASE
(LA MALADIE DE SACHS) FRANCE 1999
Cast: Albert Dupontel Valerie Dreville Francois Clavier
Director: Michele Deville
Running time: 107 minutes
Bruno Sachs is a doctor in a small town in France and firmly believes that love will be good for what ails him. Although he maintains a façade of dignity and compassion and is respected by his patients, he’s not happy with his work. Deep down he actually resents most of his patients. To supplement his income, Bruno performs abortions at a hospital in a nearby town. One of his patients is a young woman named Pauline and Bruno finds her charming and attractive. This heart-warming, light romantic comedy won three awards at the San Sebastian Film Festival and picked up three nominations from the French Academy of Cinema.
LOVE ME FRANCE 2000
Cast: Christine Boisson Johnny Halliday Julie Depardieu
Julian Sands Aurore Clement
Director: Laetitia Masson
Running time: 107 minutes
Laetitia Masson’s third film charts the dreamlike romantic odyssey of a young French woman, Gabrielle, who travels from a psychiatric clinic in Normandy to the United States. Here she dreams of finding her knight in shining armour. She ends up in Memphis, home of her idol, Elvis Presley. She meets and falls in love with an ageing rock star, Lennox (crooner Johnny Halliday), who is reduced to belting out Presley classics in empty hotel lounges. It’s a complex film, strikingly photographed.
INNER CITY
(ETAT DES LIEUX) FRANCE 1995
Cast: Patrick Dell’ Isola Francois Dyrek Stephane Ferrara
Director: Jean-Francois Richet
Running time: 76 minutes
This film belongs to the genre of French realist cinema that takes the country’s inner cities as its subject. It is fresh and angry. The central hero is factory worker Pierre Seface, a politically aware activist whose message is clearly traditional Marxist dogma. He denounces the daily alienation of the working man and the tedium of the consumer society. The director, Jean-Francois Richet, has styled his film in a naturalistic, quasi-documentary style. If you’re looking for something off the beaten track, this one’s for you.
HOMETOWN BLUE
(LE BLEU DES VILLES) FRANCE 1999
Cast: Florence Vignon Mathilde Seigner Antoine Chappey
Director: Stephane Brize
Running time: 101 minutes
Solange works as a meter maid and spends her days fending off complaints from motorists who believe they’ve been unjustly fined. At the age of 30 she finds herself in the midst of a premature midlife crisis. She’s been married for five years to Patrick, who works in the morgue at a local hospital. She aspires to be a singer, but only performs with a karaoke set-up at home. Her dissatisfaction becomes even stronger when an old school friend, Mylene — now a celebrity — comes to town. This bittersweet comedy was shown as part of the Director’s Fortnight at Cannes.
NO SCANDAL
(PAS DE SCANDAL) FRANCE 1999
Cast: Isabelle Huppert Fabrice Luchine Vincent Lindon
Director: Benoit Jacquot
Running time: 105 minutes
Gregoire is a prominent French industrialist whose financial misdealings land him a term in prison. The situation becomes extremely embarrassing for his brother, Louis, a talk-show host specialising in hard-hitting investigative interviews. After Gregoire’s release from prison he finds his marital situation changed. At the hair salon frequented by his wife, Gregoire befriends the hairstylist Stephanie whose boyfriend was released from the same prison on the same day as himself. Shown in competition at both the Venice and Toronto Film Festivals
THE AGE OF POTENTIAL
(L’AGE DES POSSIBLES) FRANCE 1996
Cast: Anne Cantineau Christele Tual Isabelle Olive
Director: Pascale Ferran
Running time: 105 minutes
A captivating young ensemble of underemployed Strasbourg singles falls in and out of love with breathtaking speed in this poignant comedy-drama from Pascale Ferran. Nobody blends love, sex and philosophy quite like the French. The film begins with a tone of light flirtation, gradually growing more serious as the flurry of dangerous liaisons accelerates as it examines the lives of five men and women, all in their early twenties, searching for their niches in an adult world. Showcasing 10 graduates of France’s premiere acting conservatory. A surprise box-office hit.
AUGUSTIN FRANCE 1995
Cast: Jean-Chretien Sibertin-Blanc Stephanie Zhang
Director: Anne Fontaine
Running time: 61 minutes
This is an unusual and engrossing comedy, cinema verite-style, and a character study of an insurance claims collector who moonlights as an actor. The film follows him from an interview to a screen test, as he tries to nab a minor part in an upcoming film. Since Augustin is thorough to the point of absurdity, he decides to research the role, that of a room-service attendant in a four-star hotel, by spending a day at one Paris’ finest establishments. The script is full of wry insights into life and there are times when it’s vaguely reminiscent of something by Woody Allen.
FORGET ME
(OUBLIE-MOI) FRANCE 1995
Cast: Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi Emmanuelle Devos Laurent Grevill
Director: Noemi Lvovsky
Running time: 95 minutes
The viewer will either love or hate the protagonist of this powerful romantic drama. The film follows the exploits of Natalie, a middle-class girl struggling to find true love. She discards her amiable boyfriend, Antoine, while stalking Eric, a hospital orderly who rejects her advances. She then tries to sleep with Fabrice, her best friend’s lover. A daring directorial exercise from Lvovsky.
LA DILETTANTE FRANCE 1999
Cast: Catherine Frot Bernard Verley Barbara Schulz
Director: Pascal Thomas
Running time: 118 minutes
Pierette returns to Paris after spending 15 years living the good life in Switzerland. Describing herself as having opted for the temporary on a permanent basis, she has no idea of what she’ll be doing next. She lands a job at a school and tries to re-introduce herself to her daughter. Her life suddenly takes on some meaning when she meets a charming new beau and starts helping him out with his antique business. An offbeat comedy —- the first from Thomas in eight years.