Discoveries from France World Cinema

Anne, a Parisian, visits her friend Yola in Tel Aviv, where Yola lives with her husband Avi and their son. There's tension in the air and the attraction between the two women is palpable. Flash back five years to their meeting, on a train to Jerusalem. Yola invites Anne to stay at her hotel, and over the next five days, their friendship builds from talk about their lives to an explosive menage a trois when Avi joins them on fourth day. Back in the present, can Yola have both Avi and Anne, or are the women futilely chasing rainbows?

In a maternity hospital, young single mothers are accompanied by social worker Hélène Lambert, who tries to make them aware of their new responsibilities, while Dr. Baurain stresses the importance of their moral and sexual education. They come to the aid of several young women: one who would like to give up her child to a couple applying for adoption, another who, after the death of her first baby in dramatic circumstances, is expecting a second, and many others.

In this gothic romance based on a 1950s novel by Robert Margerit, after a whirlwind romance, Violette, a Parisian girl, has married Gustave Dupin, a charming aristocrat, and returned with him to live on his country estate. There, she begins to discover that all is not as it seemed, and beneath her groom's charming exterior is an undreamt-of savagery. She forms an alliance with her husband's much saner brother Bastien which saves her in the end, but not before she must go on trial for the murder of her husband.

A feature length documentary shot in Iceland on mediums and the relationship between humans and invisible beings such as elves ghosts, angels, water monsters and extra-terrestrials. The film is a journey to the frontiers of life questioning the scope of our existence. Are we alone in the universe? If life exists in other dimensions, it's worth knowing more.

Louise lives alone and seems to like it that way. She has been through a divorce and the recent death of her mother. Recently, she has moved to Annecy, a moderate-sized city, to take work as a schoolteacher. She encounters a much younger man, Luigi, an Italian who is down on his luck. Though he moved to France to find work, he was robbed of his money and papers and is stranded. When he helps her bury her dogs, which her neighbour has poisoned for barking, their relationship grows to a new level.

In this contemporary adaptation of Pierre Corneille’s brilliant, eponymous 17th century play, the enigmatic Alcandre is now a hotel concierge who uses the myriad in-house high-tech security cameras to show worried father Pridamant the whereabouts and travails of his son, Clindor. As Pridamant witnesses the conflicting romances involving his estranged son, Corneille’s modernist meta-narrative is transposed to contemporary Paris, underscoring the ambiguous nature of love, wealth and desire in an age of consumerism. (Chicago International Film Festival)

Walking alone and looking desperate, young Marie-Lou is taken in hand by Léo, a street photographer and his squatter friends. They all want to know what happened to her, so to satisfy their curiosity, Marie-Lou starts recounting her unfortunate experiences as a housemaid. On account of adverse circumstances, she tells them, she lost all of the jobs she had in five different families. To crown it all, the young man she has fallen in love with, a brilliant artist, is in prison...

State secrets, sincere convictions, ecstatic crowds, a regal lifestyle, prying journalists, suspicious disappearances: what goes on behind the scenes in the halls of power or the daily life of a President.

Returning from a two-year stay in Terre Adélie, explorer Bernard Villiers meets up with his best friend, Thomas Desjardins, whose diplomatic duties call him to London. While Thomas is away, Bernard learns that Catherine, his wife, has run off with his collaborator Michel. Out of friendship for Thomas, and always resourceful, he follows the couple and tries to separate them. He does so much, in fact, that he falls in love with Catherine.

Agnès de Louvigny, aviator, crashes with her plane on the villa of Martial Simonet, a fashion designer nicknamed La Patronne. But tourists are busy in front of the villa.

As summer drags by, 13-year-old Jimmy, forced by circumstance to become an adult too soon, runs up against the limits of his small hometown and his turbulent life, caught between a mother on the slide and a stepfather who keeps her down.

Léo, un vieux père de famille ancien représentant de commerce, est prêt à tout pour retrouver l'affection de ses trois fils, David, Max et Simon. Il va même jusqu'à invoquer une maladie et une intervention chirurgicale pour les convaincre de l'accompagner dans un voyage au Canada, où il tentera de refaire l'unité du clan familial. Le quatuor de Français y fera la rencontre d'une guérisseuse et de sa fille.

Jeanne and Paul, both in their seventies, lead peaceful yet gloomy lives as retirees in the south of France. On the day of a heatwave, the sudden appearance of a river will definitively turn their daily lives upside down.

At the request of settler boss Miles Forman, Natty Bumppo leads his trek to Michilimackinac, accompanied by Chingachgook. The group of settlers includes the criminal Bush family. After a few days, the wagon trail meets the Pawnee Indian tribe, whose chief Weucha knows Natty and by whom the settlers are warmly received. On the onward journey, the Bush sons veer off to seemingly hunt but sell the Sioux weapons they had stolen from a fort before leaving. On the way back to the trek they are surprised by two hunting Pawnees. In the following fight, one of the Bush sons is killed. The archer is immediately shot, and the other Indian is supposed to be lynched in the camp of the whites. Chingachgook, however, cuts the rope with a bullet. Later, Father Ismael Bush incites the peaceful Pawnees and Sioux against each other by having a Sioux killed and leading suspicion to the Pawnees. The Sioux attack and destroy the Pawnee village.

Saul De Tarse is a Roman soldier who is making rough all over. He arrives at the Golgotha when the apostles remove the cross. He ruthlessly persecutes the Christians, even though they are his own friends.

Melun, on 1959. On the return to an auction, a young and attractive widow, Elisabeth Vernon, finds at her home(with her) a wounded escapee of prison. The fugitive, Daniel Morane, is a handsome boy and justifies himself crimes(murders) of which we accuse it. The young woman is allowed convince, seduce, feels sorry, and agrees to help him(it). But during their escape(mare), the doubt seizes her …

After ten years of doing nothing, Orel and Gringe are in their mid 30s and they struggle to finish their first rap album. Their texts are mostly sex jokes and booze stories and reflect the everyday life they have in a small town from France. The problem is that they never really finished a song and when their producers want to meet, they have to face a new challenge : finish their first song in the next 24h. Their old issues, the fear of failure, their alcoholic friends and annoying girlfriends won't help them to do so, or will they ?

In Macao, where places of pleasure and arms trafficking are concentrated, a tragedy opposes an adventurer and his daughter whom he has brought up in ignorance of his profession. She is torn from her environment and saved from tragedy by a young journalist who loves her.

The Count of Kerlor, to chastise his wife whom he believes to be unfaithful, entrusts his son to a couple of scoundrels. When he repents and wants to find the child, the carnies make their nephew sick. But the other little boy, in search of his comrade, is recognized by his reconciled parents.

Dimitri joins La Maison, a place where people are welcomed for whom medicine can not do anything anymore. There he meets Suzanne, a volunteer who is dedicated to supporting people at the end of their lives.

In a daydream, a shy bank clerk is led by a fairy into a subterranean world where people transform into animals and waxworks come to life. Lucie, his office crush, follows him but a bad fairy is intent on keeping them apart.

Marie, a young bourgeois and Jean, a cargo sailor have an affair, she becomes pregnant but he has to go back to the sea. Marie leaves for Paris where she meets Pierre and marries him. War breaks out, Jean and Pierre will befriend each other on the front.

Hôtel La Louisiane is, at its core, a film about freedom and dignity. Freedom for those who wish to live in a place where they are able to feel inspired. Dignity for the hotel owner to stand by his promise to his father and keep their mission alive: to provide an affordable sanctuary for artists and students in search of fulfilling employment, which they certainly won’t find at other hotels. Freedom, too, to be in an environment of tolerance and rid of prejudice. This film is not just a story about a mythical setting in Paris; it portrays the microcosm of a lifestyle in which collective values reign supreme. A film where what’s real and true is placed above national borders or cultural barriers.

With my wife, Olga Poliakoff, we made "I'm Eight Years Old" based on an idea by René Vautier. Using drawings by Algerian children who were refugees in Tunisia, the film immerses the viewer in the traumatized world of these children, horrifically linking the word "France" with words like "kill," "burn," and "torture." The live-action footage was shot in Tunisia by René Vautier and myself. A second set of drawings was compiled, and the children's testimonies were recorded by Olga at the Algerian-Tunisian border. The entire film was edited in collaboration with Jacqueline Meppiel. The first screening took place in Paris on February 10, 1962, without any precautions or authorization, for about fifty people. Sponsored by the Maurice Audin Committee, the film then circulated clandestinely throughout France in dozens of copies and was seen by tens of thousands of people while the OAS was carrying out bombings in Paris and Algiers – Yann Le Masson

A large house surrounded by vineyards. A Christmas Eve in a very blended family turns into an absolute nightmare when the mistress of the house tells her new husband that she is pregnant. She doesn't know that he can't have children...

When a group of student actors travel to a workshop in Dordogne to put on a production of Shakespeare's As You Like It as a summer project, they are as lively and high-spirited a group as one could ask for. While they are there, the young man who has the leading role begins casting cow eyes at the director's wife (Valerie Stroh), and soon she and the boy are having an affair. By the end of the summer, the wife is sufficiently charmed to wonder how she could have gotten into this situation where she deeply loves both men.

A dancer personifying Winter, dances in the snow. "L'Hiver: Danse de la neige" is the fourth and last film of the series DANSE DES SAISONS. "Le Printemps: Danse des roses", "L'Eté: Danse de la moisson" and "L'Automne: Danse des vendanges" are lost or unlocated.

Over time, Queen Marie-Antoinette, who was the most hated woman of her time, experienced a spectacular return to favor. Today, historians and curators show another character: an independent and loving woman in constant search of intimacy who knew how to keep her secrets; a woman with refined, feminine and modern taste who marked her time. At Versailles, in this sublime setting cut off from the world where she barricaded herself, Marie-Antoinette cultivated her own style and influenced, throughout Europe, the tastes of her time.

A documentary on the world of fashion. Using archive material, journalist Loïc Prigent remembers the key figures and events in the wacky world of haute couture, which is not always glamorous so much as downright vicious.

Gina, 15, lives in a city on the edge of the forest. She admires her father, unpredictable and whimsical, able to take his children at night in the woods, even to forget them. Jimmy's more and more frequent skids end up alarming his wife Carole. Soon, the fragile family balance is broken when Jimmy is interned in a psychiatric hospital. When Gina meets Nico, a boy from her neighborhood, she awakens to love and sees a chance to escape her father.

A boarding school student, Gerald, is a shy and asthmatic teenager. One night, he decides to follow his roommate Theo and his gang to try the game they secretly play at night…

The one joy in the lives of a mother and daughter comes from the regular letters sent to them from Paris from the family's adored son, Otar. When the daughter finds out that Otar has died suddenly, she tries to conceal the truth from her mother, changing the course of their lives forever.

A journey through the artistic life of the British-American rock band The Pretenders, formed in 1978, and a portrait of its leader, the charismatic singer and songwriter Chrissie Hynde.

Tonight's program has been composed by and for grown-ups who are children at heart. Eternal history, the tale of Belle-Rose. Also known as Beauty and the Beast.

Simon and Zoé meet on Tinder. They live in the same suburban town and Zoé, wasting no time, invites him right over to her house. Simon can’t believe his luck! But once he arrives, he quickly understands that his date may prove more complicated than expected.

Eleven-year old Dora (Nathalie Manet) is forced to chase after clues concerning her inventor-father's death while being chased by thugs working for big industry. Not only is she seeking to understand her father's mysterious death, but some of the clues he gave her indicate that he invented something unusual which the big companies want. She barely escapes being kidnapped and is helped in her search by a magical fairy and an aspiring actress.

A lawyer finds a special nanny who teaches his children all about prejudice and love.

Laurent, a young playboy, lives off his charms, maintained by wealthy women of the world. He becomes the lover of Sonia, a young woman painter, a lover at heart of course. But Sonia has a provincial friend, Clotilde. One day, Clotilde pays Bona a visit. As she has just come into a large inheritance, Laurent courts her and marries her. The young couple embark on a misguided life of easy pleasures and questionable company. Clotilde's nerves crack at this game. Among Laurent's acquaintances, François, a doctor, treats her in his clinic: sleep cure, rest, etc. Meanwhile, Laurent distracts himself with other women. But Clotilde, convalescing, refuses to resume life together. Laurent turns to his former mistress, Sonia.

The adventures of Hergé, or how Georges Remi created The Adventures of Tintin. Interviews, archive footage and animation clips tell the story of Tintin, which is the history of the 20th century.

Jean-Pierre, a twenty-three-year-old Belgian theater actor, is engaged to a charming seamstress, Anne Jacquemin, who dreams of nothing else but a quiet married life with children. Belonging to a Brussels company, Jean-Pierre wants to experience more and decides to join a stock company that performs in the South of France. There he meets Juliette Allard, a young dancer who is the lookalike of Anne. As beautiful as her, she is more mysterious and fascinating than Anne. Jean-Pierre loves both: will he be able to choose between these two equally appealing women?

A valuable painting has been stolen from an art gallery in Paris.. On a train travelling between Paris and Rome, Zutra, a mysterious and sinister character, tries to find the stolen painting.

La vie quand même (LIFE AFTER ALL) is another film in a series collectively called 'Tales from the Orphanage'. The story is simple on the surface (children coping with the sudden loss of parents), but in the hands of writer Sophie Tasma and director Olivier Péray this storyline unfolds a tale of brotherly love that is well worth watching.

Two best friends fall in love with the same boy.

In 1997, for it's fiftieth anniversary, the Cannes Film Festival asked Leos Carax for a short film, a kind of postcard addressed to the festival, in which the director would give news of himself and of his film project "Pola X."

Exploring the issue of stolen children in Spain, the plot tracks Vera’s search for her biological son, given in adoption, thereby coming across Cora and her adoptive son Egoz.

A young man trapped in his own phobias, only to be liberated by an unexpected visitor...

Emerging from a lengthy dinner where his mother was exhibited without restraint for the favor of a man, Daniel returns alone, sickened. Without imagining the trap closes on him, he later agrees to have a drink with a neighbor he just help carry packages. She "vamp" and keeps her house without a very fierce resistance opposes too happy to escape his solitude. Taking advantage of the absence of his mother, Daniel finally leaves the high school and moved to the neighbor who, having close to her more often, gets him a place in the clinic where she is employed.

The heroine in L'Eau Vive is the unwilling heir to a fortune. Young Hortense (Pascale Audret) has always known that her family was greedy, but until she inherits her father's hidden millions she has no idea how loathsome her relatives could be. Surrounded on all sides by grubby, outstretched hands, Hortense takes some comfort in the fact that her legacy is still missing. When the money is finally recovered, our heroine does the "right thing" with her windfall, leaving her mercenary family empty-handed. Throughout the film, Hortense's dilemma is likened to a government dam project not far from her home; as the bridge grows in size, so too does Hortense's resolve to rise above the nastiness all around her.

The Mandrin Cave in the Rhône Valley is a fascinating excavation site. Archaeologist Ludovic Slimak discovered fossils and flints here, proving that Neanderthals inhabited the cave for over 80,000 years. The first Neanderthal in France for half a century was also unearthed in the cave: He was given the name Thorin.

Danuta Zarasik plays Isabelle Eberhardt in this biographical drama. At the turn of the 20th century, Isabelle fell in love with the African desert, donning men's clothing to travel and record her adventures in writing while her Moslem husband patiently waited at home. This visually stunning feature shows the overwhelming majesty and beauty of the forces of nature. Director Christine Laurent relies upon her expertise as a painter and designer to bring an added dimension of artistic beauty to the film.

7 American high school girls visit Paris.

In eight films, Jacques Audiard has renewed French cinema, without alienating either the critics or the success. It is only at the age of 42 that he starts directing, after having been an editor and a scriptwriter. In 1994, he directed his first film, "Regarde les hommes tomber", whose conflicting shooting was an ordeal for this misanthropic beginner. It was with "Sur mes lèvres", in 2001, that he forged his cinematographic language: contained lyricism, deliberate imperfection of images, ellipses plunging the audience into a maelstrom of sensations. With each of his films, Jacques Audiard intends to renew himself, at the cost of challenges and doubts always more vivid.

Colin and Mailland are small-time crooks on the run who are surprised to find the seven-year-old runaway Savannah is along for the ride. The police and her parents fear she has been kidnapped, and a massive manhunt is launched with orders to shoot to kill the alleged perpetrators. The lovable little girl soon melts the hearts of the crooks, as the trio enjoy an unlikely but sentimental friendship.

After the coup d'État of the Democratic government of Allende, the embassy of Italy in Santiago played a major role in helping the opposers of the regime, and extradited many of them to Italy.

When an elderly priest died, the people in charge of his diocese discovered that it was a woman. Without anyone suspecting it, she had been practicing her vocation for years. Dismayed, the bishop decided to launch an investigation and asked the chancellor of the diocese to find out how, why and with what complicity such a deception was possible.

At the cable car station connecting Avoriaz to Morzine, 75-year-old Barbara Herbier emerges from between the cabins, looking distraught. Cornered by her invisible attacker, Barbara falls over the railing and disappears into the void. This is only the beginning of a series of sudden and deadly incidents that will strike the Herbier family. Claire Garibaldi, a police officer in Lyon, doesn't believe much in legends when she returns to investigate the scene of her childhood.