In spite of enthusiastic recommendations from friends and good reviews in the press, I was hesitant to see Cédric Klapisch’s new film, En Corps (Rise). I had loved his early film Chacun Cherche Son Chat (When the Cat’s Away) but … Read More
Cinematic adaptations of books always carry with them multiple challenges. How faithful, for example, should one be to the written text? What should be omitted or added? And how does the film work purely on its own terms, without knowledge … Read More
Good intentions do not a good movie make, as demonstrated by French director Alice Diop’s latest film, the documentary Nous (We). Diop is strongly committed to showing onscreen the lives of the “little people,” perhaps better described as ordinary humans, … Read More
Those of you who know Laure Calamy from her role as Noémie, Mathias’s assistant in Call My Agent, will be delighted to see her movie acting career going from strength to strength. She won the 2021 César for Best Actress … Read More
Act 1 of Nicole Garcia’s new film, Amants: It opens, fittingly for a movie called Lovers, with a couple in bed, her naked body pasted on top of his. She is Lisa (Stacy Martin), he is Simon (Pierre Niney). A small-time … Read More
Les Olympiades is a place few visitors to Paris have ever seen or would probably ever want to see. A “city within a city” in the 13th arrondissement, the 1970s development consists of bland highrise apartment buildings, shops and offices, … Read More
Adapting the sprawling novels of Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) for the screen is never a simple process, and from all accounts director Xavier Giannoli has been working on the screenplay for Illusions Perdues (Lost Illusions) for a number of years. … Read More
When a French movie is described as a “comedy” and has a July release date in Paris, it almost invariably means that (1) it’s a generic film about a chaotic summer holiday with families/groups of mature male friends/bands of teens … Read More
Director Sébastien Lifshitz is a brave man. For five years he embedded himself and his camera in the lives of two adolescent girls in the French provincial town of Brive, recording the traumas and joys of that fraught stage of … Read More
In the midst of the furor surrounding Roman Polanski’s award as best director for J’Accuse at last week’s Césars (the French Oscars), Les Misérables, the movie that won for best film, has undeservedly gone under the radar. Those hoping for another … Read More
