French films are shit. Porquoi?

Did the auteur movement signify a shift in opportunity and power from playwrights to screenwriters to directors?

Reading this again I'm not sure there was ever a time where the screenwriter had much power in Hollywood? Always quite low on the totem pole I think. Famous playwrights/writers getting their stuff adapted a different kettle of fish ofc.

Has a similar shift ever been thought possible from composers to conductors?

Except in the most industrial, regimented film industry situations, I'm sure that film directors have more control and leeway over their work than orchestra conductors.

the thing about influencers is that they deal in pictures (right now from what i can gather) and if anyone feared that language would disappear as a consequence, then fear no longer: i think by now everyone knows the limitations are obvious. but film and video communicate consequence and that still strikes me as a danger to surplace language. for artists and scientists i think one wants the greatest challenge in being clear when the meaning can be ambiguous.

communicate consequence and experience

perhaps silent film is so much followed because it was when film had to speak for itself and at first only gags or memes (sorry for retrospective use) were thought possible and remarkably it was possible and so the lurking possibilities of suggestion lingered in those who cared about the history

I want to see all of Jean-Louis Trintignant's films that I have not yet seen.

That guy was so good.

V nice piece on Eustace, May 68 and French Cinema (revived from the archives as the writer has passed away) (apart from a couple of bits that don't scan for me)

https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/mother-whore-dandy

New 4K restoration of The Mother and the Whore opens Cannes with Jean-Pierre Léaud and Françoise Lebrun in attendance:

https://www.cahiersducinema.com/actualites/eustache-les-yeux-neufs/?fbclid=IwAR0K8g-Z9Bt6TdEh3Aqlg4xgZQn31zDUg3KGgol14-KIfyURajRLGRsDPwk

― Ward Fowler, Thursday, May 19, 2022 9:36 AM (one year ago) bookmarkflaglink

https://www.filmlinc.org/daily/flc-and-janus-films-welcome-you-to-the-dirty-stories-of-jean-eustache/

"The Dirty Stories of Jean Eustache" (June-July 2023, then to tour to "select North American cities")

Looks fantastic!

https://jeaneustache.film/

A website for the touring retrospective. (No DC-area dates yet. I would expect this sort of thing to be parceled out between AFI Silver and the National Gallery of Art.)

Eustache restored, and at the BFI

https://whatson.bfi.org.uk/Online/default.asp?BOparam::WScontent::loadArticle::permalink=jeaneustache&BOparam::WScontent::loadArticle::context_id=

Eustache at the National Gallery of Art (DC)

https://www.nga.gov/calendar/film-programs/jean-eustache.html

Missed this last month, but Time Out Paris apparently counted down the 100 best French films ever:

https://letterboxd.com/alexfung/list/time-out-paris-100-best-french-films-2023/

No sign of Amelie or The Intouchables anywhere, so well done!

Pretty good.

Far too much Truffaut; far too little Haneke xp

well Caché is on there

nice to see Air de Famille there too, always been a favourite of mine

Amour's in there too; I think 2 of 100 is more than enough Haneke

lol.
Un Air de Famille probably the best Jaoui/Bacri but there are so many good ones. Comme Une Image, or Le Goût Des Autres come to mind

Was there some contractual obligation for every film to have Depardieu in the 70s?

Of the lesser known films on this list, I saw Je t'aime je t'aime the other day, an excellent nouvelle vague / time travel mashup, if you like La Jetee you'd like this one

biggest wtf for me is Blue Is The Warmest Colour in the top50, thought we'd all agreed to memory hole that one

Amour's in there too; I think 2 of 100 is more than enough Haneke

― Dwigt Rortugal (Eric H.), Monday, 16 October 2023 bookmarkflaglink

Rather have more Haneke than half a dozen Truffaut films, which is what stood out for me.

Right, well one Truffaut (400 Blows) is also enough

"Je t'aime je t'aime"

Thought this was an inspired choice.

xp = yup, just that one.

Haneke can go dominate the 100 greatest austrian films list :)

Slightly surprising there is no Celine Sciamma (?)

biggest wtf for me is Blue Is The Warmest Colour in the top50, thought we'd all agreed to memory hole that one

― Daniel_Rf,

She was wonderful in Passages. I have a forgiving heart.

Day for Night I'd take out, but the other Truffaut films are great and at least several more (Shoot the Piano Player, The Wild Child, The Green Room, etc) would make strong candidates.

I'm actually not a fan of Haneke - I probably agree with his ideas in a broader sense, but I always felt like he put them across in a sneering, contemptuous way. If I really had to include one of his films, it would probably be Code Unknown.

I like Amour more than most ILXers, thanks to Trintignant.

Trintignant was wonderful, so was Riva. They both gave great performances and to be fair, Haneke deserves some credit for that (not unless they told him "f--- off, I do what I want," which I highly doubt). I just hate how he filmed that movie and their performances in particular. At best, you could say it was cold and clinical, but at worst it was callous and terrible, particularly the climactic scene which I found repulsive in the way it was composed.

Let me reel it back in a bit - there are at least a couple of moments that were movingly depicted, such as this one. But the cruel ones weigh heavier in memory.

Reminds me Je t’aime, je t’aime is on sale at Kino Now right now.

Unfortunately, the color is way, way off. It's a problem with a lot of color films being restored from that era - revisionist color timing, and in this case, it's a egregious, cold, blue-looking palette. (From what I can tell, everyone who's familiar with this film's history has been very critical of the new look.) But it's a great film, and that still comes through despite the tinkering to the color.

I watched a dodgy rip from some dodgy Russian website, but I guess I'm no film purist!

She was wonderful in Passages. I have a forgiving heart.

tbc it's not her performance that I think is the issue with that film!

it's a rubbish list, which is tautological i guess

hating this list

I dunno, there are things on here that are new to me, which is all I think you can really ask from a (stupid, pointless) list.

Surprised at how high Les Valseuses placed. I watched it this year, and it has dated very poorly, including the woeful rape-that-turns-into-pleasure trope.

That and Blue/Warmest are examples of what the French call "le doubling down"

le merde

I've not seen 39 but tbh there are a few things I just don't give a fuck about. Is Rozier any good? MUBI is hosting a couple of films of his and can't say I cared.

If I really had to include one of his films, it would probably be Code Unknown.

― birdistheword, Tuesday, 17 October 2023 bookmarkflaglink

I love Haneke a lot (none of his films were on the S&S poll, which rankled), but CU was the one I wanted to see here.

Yes, Code Unknown above all else, though I liked Cache and Time of the Wolf too.

I think probably a lot of the stuff on the list that ILXors haven't seen is French postwar popular cinema, there's a lot of films that are huge within France but have next to no exposure outside of it. Stuff like Le Pere Noel Est Une Ordure, La Classe Americaine, L'Homme de Rio...and La Grande Vadrouille, which features two comedians that are viewed as Gods in France (De Funès and Bourvil) and was the highest grossing movie ever in the country until Titanic took its spot (I've seen it - it's one of those 60's caper comedies that are best watched in an alcoholic haze over the holidays. Terry-Thomas is in it!).

Yeah, there's some o_0 titles littered throughout this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-grossing_films_in_France

No desire whatsoever to see the films of the Asterix & Obelix series

Code Unknown
The Piano Teacher
Caché
Amour

^^ all the Haneke I need

I don't know if it's that o_0 really, every nation has its equivalents - not like Japanese box office is all Naruse or Italian box office all Antonioni.

One of those Asterix movies is good but I don't remember which one.

True, every national cinema has its own terrible, unfunny comedies

Carry on Films hello