French films are shit. Porquoi?

there are more, brontosaur, but they go downhill after SK.

Costa Garvas dbl bill at the Lumiere tomorrow, btw

aargh, Costa-Gavras

finally saw the Class the other night. It was very good. I also recently caught up with Kings and Queen and A Christmas Tale. I <3 Mathieu Amalric. Got Summer Hours to watch later.

Costas's Z was fantastic! What an ending...lots of speed, humour, some great music - I should chase up the novel the film was based on.

When you go to the Lumiere do they play actual films or some kind of high quality DVDs or what? I watched some week-long Fantomas thing and it was bitty and gritty and obviously digital. I wasn't annoyed. I accepted it. I just wondered whether they had a normal projector.

I assume they do have a normal projector as they screen worn out prints of old films, most of which haven't even been issued on DVD. Z was like that (and dubbed, first time I saw anything at the Lumiere w/out subtitles).

fantomas would probably be a dvd projection. it's possible there's a modern-type print of it but i can't imagine from when.

amazed 'z' hasn't been on dvd!

Z is coming out on Criterion next month.

on dv-Z

I think 35 Rhums (35 Shots of Rum) is as good as anything Claire Denis has made, at least since Nenette et Boni.

French Cinema Week here in Oporto, please tell me if any of these movies are good:

"Mia Et Le Migou", Jacques Rémy Girerd
"Pour Un Instant La Liberté", Arash T. Riahi
"Les Enfants De Timpelbach", Nicolas Bary
"Passe-Passe", Tonie Marshall
"Erreur De La Banque En Votre Faveur", Gérard Bitton & Michel Munz
"J'ai Toujours Revê D'Être Un Gangster", Samuel Benchetrit
"Le Plaisir De Chanter", Ilan Duran Cohen (great name btw)
"Le Premier Jour Du Reste De Ta Vie", Rémi Benzançon
"L'Anée Suivante", Isabelle Czajka
"Le Bal Des Atrices", Maiwenn
"Coco Chanel Et Igor Stravinsky", Jan Kounen
"L'Armée Du Crime", Robert Guédiguian
"Éden À L'Ouest", Costa-Garvas (!)
"Ne Te Retourne Pas", Marina De Van

"Mia Et Le Migou", Jacques Rémy Girerd - don't know this film even though I know the name.
"Pour Un Instant La Liberté", Arash T. Riahi don't know
"Les Enfants De Timpelbach", Nicolas Bary - more of a kids movie, not good from all I've heard. Kind of a flop in France.
"Passe-Passe", Tonie Marshall - don't know
"Erreur De La Banque En Votre Faveur", Gérard Bitton & Michel Munz - from what I've heard, a not very good comedy.
"J'ai Toujours Revê D'Être Un Gangster", Samuel Benchetrit - never seen it, heard a few good things about it.
"Le Plaisir De Chanter", Ilan Duran Cohen (great name btw) - don't know
"Le Premier Jour Du Reste De Ta Vie", Rémi Benzançon - this was a huge success in France, most of the people I know who've seen it really liked and those that didn't usually despised it. From what I've heard it sounds a bit like indie movies of the Little Miss Sunshine/Juno/ Gardern State variety, but don't take my word for it.
"L'Anée Suivante", Isabelle Czajka - don't know
"Le Bal Des Atrices", Maiwenn - this one had a really nice poster up in the Paris métro, but apart from that don't know much about it
"Coco Chanel Et Igor Stravinsky", Jan Kounen - the better of the two movies about Coco Chanel, but apparently that's faint praise
"L'Armée Du Crime", Robert Guédiguian - don't know much about it
"Éden À L'Ouest", Costa-Garvas (!) - same
"Ne Te Retourne Pas", Marina De Van - haven't seen it either, but this one got quite a lot of press. It was booed in Cannes and I don't think the general consensus about it has improved much.

Basically, I haven't seen too many of these so take my words with caution as they are mostly friends' opinions repeated.

I'd see Garvas/Gavras, just cuz I really trust him now.

Anyone seen the Varda doc? Her hair looks amazing, btw

Yes, Varda is a charmer.

Loved loved Beaches of Agnes! Where else will we able to see contributions from Harrison Ford and Chris Marker in the same film?

Star Wars VII: The Empire without a Cat

on offer at this year's london film fest:

http://www.bfi.org.uk/lff/films/french_revolutions

I need to see this:
http://www.bfi.org.uk/lff/films/french_revolutions/408

god i hate this thread title

pork oi

New Bruno Dumont! Can't hang around till late tho' :-(

Daniel, I saw J'ai toujours reve d'etre un gangster yesterday, and thoroughly enjoyed it. It sagged a bit in the middle but there are lots of laughs to be had.

Lucky you being in Porto, by the way. I love that city.

The Barbican is doing a short Directorspective on Jacques Tati in Decemeber: http://www.barbican.org.uk/film/series.asp?ID=789

SHIT i will not be in town for playtime

SHIT

which town? NYC MoMA is showing it at year-end too:

http://www.moma.org/visit/calendar/films/1023

I won't be in London for that one either :(

I'm gonna be in Bore-deaux so I will miss both of these ;_;

Unless the Cinema Jean Vigo is screening it! Playtime should be a Christmas tradition everywhere!

It's on in Glasgow this month as well.

Jean Eustache's shortish film The Pig on Sunday at the Lumiere. Go if I cannot.

aw :/
would love to see that

Is anyone with me that Port Of Shadows is >>>> Le Jour Se Leve??

Eustache's The Pig didn't make it to Glasgow, but tonight we had the New Yorker Films subtitled print of The Mother and the Whore, probably the very same print I last saw about ten years ago. In the intervening years I've watched an even mouldier print of Rivette's L'Amour Fou, and so this time round, I was struck by certain visual and thematic similarities between the two films - both are concerned with disintegrating love affairs, bad behaviour, jealousy, passion and all that messy stuff. The performances of Jean-Pierre Leaud, Francoise Lebrun and Bernadette Lafont - the three Ls! - are just devastating.

Tomorrow the GFT are showing Numero Uno, Eustache's first documentary feature, and then on Wednesday we get My Little Loves, the full colour fiction movie that Eustache made the year after The Mother and the Whore.

You gotta go on Wednesday.

What about Une Sale Histoire?

I'll be there!

Une Sale Histoire only played in Edinburgh, sadly.

These are all screening as part of a large French film festival that's touring the UK at the moment - the Eustache 'strand' consists of seven films in total (six of them UK premieres.) The other ones that didn't make it to Glasgow were Bad Company and Santa Claus has Blue Eyes.

last year's Cesar winner Seraphine is a digestible artist bio, esp for Yolande Moreau and the cinematography.

didn't think it was bad or anything but what's the big deal about 'the prophet'?

there seems to be this thing of anglo filmcrits unduly praising french directors that go against 'type', trascending the cold fuck outta the constraints of genre and, who'd have thought, beating the americans at their own game

heh for a certain generation of british critics, french people make much better americans than americans do

i dunno if this even did "transcend" genre! im not always against that as a concept, even. but in this case, we just have a quite detailed and mostly well-made prison/crime drama. it wasn't, in the way genre-transcenders typically do, "saying anything" about the human condition or what have you. was it? soem guy told me something about the meaning of the title before i saw it but i've forgotten what.

it means that you never can quite tell when you should pronounce the "t" at the ends of french words

did you see the movie?

Jacques Audiard - A Prophet

POLTERGAY
POLTERGAY
POLTERGAY

"saying anything" about the human condition or what have you

i think it was, specific to france, where the identities and slow integration of algerian/muslim/old school french communities is subject for debate.

POLTERGAY is the best film ever! And it is French! And has French Gay Ghosts from the Seventies!

otm

xpost

it's not a "transcend" genre, except maybe for the subtle use of surrealism, but it's a perfect version of the genre imo
Scorsese and Taramtino will probably never offer a new perfect crime movie again, and Audiard simply takes their place with this movie.
i think it's better than the flashy,pointless and now banal shots in Goodfellas for example,it is a much more authentic effort, thats all.

trailer for godard's new(last?) 'socialisme' worth seeing, with alain badiou reprising the karina role from pierrot le fou (maybe)

alain badiou reprising the karina role

if this is true, and godard has made a elderly gay man road movie (is belmondo even alive?), than that'd be something.

sea movie, aptly