Film-Forward

French

Rendez-Vous with French Cinema 2014

If you’re lucky enough to see only a handful of what the mini-festival Rendez-Vous with French Cinema has to offer, you’re likely to have a sense of déjà vu, or at least left wondering, strange, I’ve seen that face before. One of the resulting pleasure of this annual series—23 features this year—is that in a […]

Jimmy P.

Directed by Arnaud Desplechin Written by Mr. Desplechin, with Kent Jones & Julie Peyr, based on Reality and Dream by Georges Devereux Produced by Jennifer Roth, Pascal Caucheteux & Grégoire Sorlat Released by IFC Films France/USA. 114 min. Not rated With Benicio Del Toro, Mathieu Amalric, Gina McKee, Larry Pine, Joseph Cross, Michelle Thrush and […]

Live-Action Oscar Shorts 2014

Released by ShortsHD 97 min. Not rated “Do I Have To Take Care of Everything?” The briefest, by half, of this year’s Oscar nominated live-action shorts makes more of an impact than its tone and brevity might suggest. The Finnish short covers a morning in the chaotic life of the Ketonin family, scrambling like mad […]

The Last of the Unjust

Directed by Claude Lanzmann Produced by David Frenkel, Jean Labadie & Danny Krausz Released by Cohen Media Group German, French and English, with English subtitles France/Austria. 218 min. Rated PG-13 Historical facts, interpretation, and blame are strikingly embodied by Benjamin Murmelstein. His singular life and experiences, during and after the Holocaust, have inspired magic realism […]

Stranger by the Lake

Directed by Alain Guiraudie Produced by Sylvie Pialat Released by Strand Releasing French with English subtitles France. 97 min. Not rated With Pierre Deladonchamps, Christophe Paou & Patrick D’Assumçao Tense, erotic, and coolly transfixing, Stranger by the Lake captivates through its slow-burning intensity and its brazen exhibition of sexuality. Its components are a bit unconventional, […]

What’s in a Name?

Written & Directed by Alexandre de la Patellière & Matthieu Delaporte, based on their play Produced by Dimitri Rassam & Jérôme Seydoux Released by Under the Milky Way, now available on iTunes French with English subtitles French. 109 min. Not rated With Patrick Bruel, Valérie Benguigui, Charles Berling, Judith El Zein, Guillaume de Tonquédec & […]

Blue Is the Warmest Color

Directed by Abdellatif Kechiche Written by Kechiche & Ghalya Lacroix, adapted from Le Bleu Est une Couleur Chaude by Julie Maroh Produced by Alcatraz Films, Olivier Thery Lapiney & Laurence Clerc Released by Sundance Selects. French with English subtitles France. 179 min. Rated NC-17 With Léa Seydoux, Adèle Exarchopoulos, Salim Kechiouche, Mona Walravens, Jérémie Laheurte […]

Toronto 2013 Highlights

An Indian father accompanies his young—and only—son, Siddharth, to an outdoor bus station. He waves goodbye to his smiling boy as the packed bus drives off 200 miles north, where Siddharth has been sent to work in a trolley factory. The boy, nicknamed Siddhu, is supposed to come back a month later for Diwali, but […]

Camille Claudel 1915

Written & Directed by Bruno Dumont Produced by Jean Brehat, Rachid Bouchareb & Muriel Merlin Released by Kino Lorber French with English subtitles France. 97 min. Not Rated With Juliette Binoche, Jean-Luc Vincent, Robert Leroy, Emmanuel Kauffman & Marion Keller Writer/director Bruno Dumont gives a strongly feminist interpretation to the tragic story of the thwarted […]