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FRENCH FILM FESTIVAL UK 2017
Golden Years screening as part of the FRENCH FILM FESTIVAL 2017
London’s Regent Street Cinema to host nine film screenings as part of the French Film Festival UK 2017 and will take place between 4-10 December
The biggest explosion of French and francophone cinema in the UK will hit cinemas in November as part of a major expansion of the French Film Festival UK, which is celebrating its 25th year.
MONDAY 4TH DECEMBER
ISMAEL’S GHOSTS
Just before he is about to start shooting his new film, a filmmaker’s life is turned upside down when a woman he had loved and who had disappeared, reappears. Directed by Arnaud Desplechin and starring Mathieu Amalric, Marion Cotillard, Charlotte Gainsbourg and Louis Garrel.
CORNICHE KENNEDY
Sensual, edgy, relentlessly honest and tender, Corniche Kennedy, directed by Dominique Cabrera, focusses on young people, their lives, dreams, and relationships. Taken from the eponymous novel by Maylis de Kerangal, Cabrera’s film is set in Marseilles. The title refers to the Corniche du Président-John-Fitzgerald-Kennedy, a boulevard along the coast, and at its heart is a group of contemporary teens who defy the laws of gravity by plunging into the water from a height.
WEDNESDAY 6 DECEMBER
GOLDEN YEARS
A deserter disguises himself as a woman to escape the fields of battle during the First World War in veteran André Techiné’s new film, adapted from Fabrice Virgili and Daniele Voldman’s non-fiction book The Flapper and the Killer / La garconne et l’assassin. It is the story of Paul and Louise Grappe, a young couple living their golden years before the Great War breaks out.
THE FIREMAN
With a summer heatwave raging in the south of France the fire brigade have their work out dealing with outbreaks of fires all over the terrain, some of them the deliberate work of criminal gangs. Pierre Jolivet examines how the firemen cope in the face of overwhelming odds, not least because of internal conflicts between two of the officers in charge. An uncanny prelude to the blazes that caused such devastation this year on the Côte d’Azur.
FRIDAY 8 DECEMBER
MERCENARY
The odyssey of Soane, a young Polynesian, who leaves everything behind to try his luck in France as a rugby player. French, although not considered such, Soane has a thirst for freedom, but struggles to get the recognition that he deserves
SATURDAY 9 DECEMBER
BAY OF ANGELS
A mild-mannered banker (Claude Mann) becoming obsessed with roulette. Along the way, he also becomes obsessed with an aloof platinum blonde (Jeanne Moreau) who seems to live at the roulette wheel. She returns his attentions until revealing that it was all a ruse, brought on simply because she thought he brought her good luck. It’s triumph of style, from Jean Rabier’s stunning camerawork amid sun-splashed Riviera locations to Moreau, looking resplendently like Bette Davis, to her entrance flashing across a succession of mirrors in the penultimate shot.
BEFORE SUMMER ENDS
After five years in Paris, Arash has decided to return home to Iran, but his fellow Iranian natives Hossein and Ashkan convince him to take one last trip through the South of France. As the best friends drive, drink lots of beer, and meet a pair of female French musicians, the trio experiences the thrill of a road trip imbued with a wistful longing for home. This artfully photographed non-fiction comedy beautifully captures the expat experience
SUNDAY 8 DECEMBER
A WOMAN'S BACK
A moving, beautifully modulated adaptation of Guy de Maupassant’s first novel, in which a young noblewoman copes with the loss of ideals. Stephane Brizé (The Measure of a Man) offers a dazzling mosaic of the trials and tribulations spanning 27 years in the life of Jeanne (Judith Chemla, Camille Rewinds).
THIS IS OUR LAND
This timely drama follows a young nurse and mother named Pauline (Émilie Dequenne), who is recruited by a right-wing politician resembling Marine Le Pen (Catherine Jacob) to be the approachable face of the National Front. Although Pauline is not particularly concerned with politics, she is seduced by the promise of an increased salary to support her family and the opportunity to make her country a safer place.
The modern art of cinema surprises me very much. But still I like art in the form of paintings and I love to go to art galleries.