Pierre Niney Fifteen Times

It's a day of the week that ends in "day" and so that means I've got another photoshoot of some random French boy to share! This began last Friday with Louis Garrel right here, then continued with actor Niels Schneider right here. And now it's moved on to our favorite cartoon person Pierre Niney looking like he stumbled right out of The Triplets of Belleville and into a fashion magazine. Hit the jump for 'em all...

Good Morning, World

Thank you to an incredibly sweaty 

Pierre Niney for this Tuesday wake-up.

Good Morning, World

French actor Pierre Niney was generous enough to share with us some photos from a recent vacation on his Instagram and natch I snatched up the ones that matter to post here, and you'll see them below. But first! While I was at Sundance news of one of my favorite mini-fests of every year broke -- the schedule and line-up for the Film at Lincoln Center's annual "Rendez-vous with French Cinema" here in New York was announced! To be clear I've been so busy I haven't even had the time to look at the schedule myself but you can check it all right here. All I did notice was what I usually first notice -- the list of hot French actors whose films are included, and Pierre here was among them (and in Michel Gondry's new movie no less!). Other lovelies include Melvil Poupaud, Anders Danielson Lee (not French but whatever), Romain Duris, Vincent Lacoste, and Nahuel Pérez Biscayart of BPM fame, and Félix Lefebvre from Summer of 85. Anyway I've finally got some substantial time this morning so I'm going to go through and see what grabs my attention -- stay tuned, I'll try to post about that later. But first let us hit the jump for a little more happy go lucky Pierre... 

Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

... you can learn from:

Human Nature (2001)

Nathan Bronfman: What is love anyway? From my new vantage point, I realize that love is nothing more than a messy conglomeration of need, desperation, fear of death and insecurity about penis size.

A happy 60th birthday to Eternal Sunshine director Michel Gondry today! It's been almost eight years since Gondry directed a feature-film -- he's done lots of shorts and eight episodes of Jim Carrey's series Kidding (which I never saw any of, did you?) but his 2015 film Microbe & Gasoline was his last full-length picture. I thought that movie was fine -- not terrifically memorable but a big step up from the movie he did right before that called The We & I, which I loathed with such fierceness I literally winced upon being reminded of it while writing this post.

Anyway just because he hadn't reached the heights of Eternal Sunshine again doesn't mean I don't want him to keep trying -- his music-videos have always been a wonder, and there's nobody else like him.  I remember going to an art exhibit of his around the time The Science of Sleep came out and it was a lo-fi magical wonderland, entire cities built of out toilet paper tubes,

That said Gondry has a new movie coming out this year! Soon in fact if you're going to Cannes this month, where it's premiering -- it's called The Book of Solutions and it stars French actor Pierre Niney, who feels like he'll translate to Gondry-dom exactly right. Hopefully it's a return to form and we'll see it everywhere else sooner rather than not sooner.

Good Morning, World

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A post shared by VEENTZ (@vincentcassel)

It's not just the photo of Vincent Cassel on the action figure box here that makes this morning's post an upper -- it's the fact that his fellow french hottie Pierre Niney was the one who gifted the shirtless action figure to him. That takes this one over the top. Weirdly though I can't find any photos of V&P together, and the meaning of the hashtags he shared for a show called Fiasco on Netflix also elude me as neither of them are listed on the show's IMDb cast-list. It's an inside joke that eludes me and I don't like it! Can some french person explain it to me? Preferably Vincent and/or Pierre, in my bathtub tonight? Cool, thanks.

Good Morning, World

Consider my joy -- Consider my joy! Consider it! -- when I found out that in the latest OSS movie in France (it's a whole series of spy films -- their James Bond basically, only comedic) there exists some homoerotic sexual tension between Jean Dujardin (the star of the latest iteration of the series) and our favorite French Gumby himself Pierre Niney? 

The joy is impressive to consider, I promise you. Almost as impressive to consider as that prominent package that Pierre's packing downstairs in these gifs. Oh I know those briefs are loaded -- that is to say I know his crotch has been stuffed for the gag (insert "gag me on that crotch" gag here). But if I can't play make-believe with Pierre Niney's bulge then I might as well toss in the towel, baby. Oh and...

... that happens too. Yes, also a gag, but I refer you to the previous paragraph. Maybe we should actually see this OSS movie? (For the record it's called OSS: From Africa With Love.) They've never really been my bag -- they're a little broad -- but these gifs and Pierre Niney in general are doing their work on my will. Anyway happy Monday morning, hit the jump for all the gifs...

Do Dump or Marry: La Flamme Bunch

This month's issue of GQ France has three hot young things on it (via) but I'll be honest -- I only know two. Above on the left is Pierre Niney, and we know him -- we have had a crush on his insanely gallic super-features ever since Francios Ozon's 2016 film Frantz. He even has a tag here on this site! And then in the middle os the above photo is actor François Civil, and he might not have a tag yet here on MNPP but we've posted about him enough he probably should -- I think the first time I noticed him would have been either in 2014's Frank opposite Michael Fassbender or the (kind of terrific) found-footage horror flick As Above So Below that same year. 

So the person I am unfamiliar with on the GQ cover is the dude on the right -- his name is Jonathan Cohen and he has the most credits of the three, but I don't think many of them have made their way out of France? The only movie's he's done that I have seen is White as Snow, the fairy-tale riff that had Isabelle Huppert playing a variation on the Evil Queen, but 1) that movie wasn't great and 2) Angela Bassett was sitting a couple seats away from me at the Tribeca screening where I saw it and I ended up paying more attention to her than I did the movie. Sorry, Mr. Jonathan Cohen!

I don't have access to the GQ interview with these three as to why they're being photographed together, but the blurb alongside where I got these photos says they are longtime friends, and their IMDb pages tell me they have also all worked on a French TV series called La Flamme, which appears to be a satirical take on The Bachelor; indeed Cohen himself appears to be the lead of that series. Any of my French readers have more information? Until then it's been awhile since I did a "Do Dump or Marry" post -- where I ask y'all to pick one person to "Do" (have one night of sex with), "Dump" (like how it sounds), and "Marry" (live with forever and ever, amen) -- and hey it's three people! That makes it easy! So tell me in the comments your answer...

And Now We Go France-ward

Every year here in New York the finest sign that Spring is imminent for me has been the finding of myself awash in delicious French Movies, thanks to FLC's annual "Rendez-vous with French Cinema" series. But this year, thanks to our ongoing situation, cough cough, that delight goes national -- the series, running March 4th through 14th, is virtual and anybody from the lobster-pots of Maine to the scorpion-stingers of SoCal and everywhere in between, purple mountains majesty, can participate. 

I ran through some highlights from the 2021 edition last week, zooming in on two big handfuls of crush-worthy actors that're showing up in this year's batch of movies, in case you missed that, but today comes two new important news items -- one, tickets are now on sale! Buy them right here! And two, FLC has dropped us a trailer to get us in the mood. Ooh la la, oui oui et cetera. (I really should learn French.)

French Boys & The Movies That Love Them

The line-up for one of my favorite yearly fests has arrived today -- the "Rendez-Vous With French Cinema" festival at Film at Lincoln Center arrives for ten straight days of Gallic bliss in March, the 4th through the 14th, and it's an astonishingly sexy line-up of 18 movies this year (not that we'd expect any less from the French), starting from the top down with the legendary sexpot Emmanuelle Béart as the fest's Guest of Honor. For one they'll be screening Francois Ozon's sweaty and super-gay Summer of 85 (which I reviewed for NewFest last fall right here), which just got nominated for a heap of César awards (aka France's Oscars). But more than ever I felt like looking through this year's line-up there's an absolutely stunning French actor in every single one, so let's pick our picks, that way!

Vincent Lacoste in Faithful -- Lacoste first popped onto our radar with Christophe Honore's heartbreaking 2018 romance Sorry Angel, which has already become one of our all-time favorite gay films at this point. And Faithful has him (and his mustache!) starring opposite another fave, Phantom Thread star Vicky Krieps! He plays an imprisoned Communist revolutionary in the 1950s; she's his wife who refuses to abandon him. 

Rabah Naït Oufella in Ibrahim -- Oufella caught our eye thanks to two totally terrific movies, Bertrand Bonello's "teens take over a shopping mall" movie Nocturama and the cannibal flick Raw -- see a nice little gallery of him right here. In Ibrahim he plays the bad-influence best-friend to the titular character (played by Abdel Bendaher, above right), a teenager trying to do good; Rabah drags him into an ill-planned robbery attempt. It played Cannes last year.

Arnaud Valois in Lifelines and Spring Blossom -- The BPM beauty has a pair of features at the fest this year; his role in Lifelines;(which is about a woman obsessed with a found diary) is described as "an intriguing supporting role" but Blossom sounds Valois-centric, with him romancing actress / director Suzanne Lindon.

Niels Schneider in Love Affair -- Niels is best known for being the doe-eyed love-interest in a couple of Xavier Dolan movies back in the day, but he's worked plenty since then -- he was just in the ace Sibyl last year. And he's nominated for Best Actor at the Césars for this movie here -- it's also nominated for Best Film, Best Director, and all the other acting categories, so I think it's one to pay attention to! It's about cousin lovers!

Pierre Niney in Lovers -- The endearingly gawky Niney was delivered unto these shores via Ozon's 2016 film Frantz and immediately became a fave -- this one's a noir-tinged love triangle also starring the terrific Stacy Martin (from Nymphomaniac and Vox Lux) and...

... our boy Benoît  Magimel from The Piano Teacher! Yes this one's a two-fer -- two hot French actors for the price of one. Plus it's a thriller -- obviously this one is high on my Must Watch Immediately list. Although I will surely be let down and the two guys will fight over the girl with nary a whiff of sexual tension between the two of them, sigh. Tis my cruel fate.

Grégoire Ludig in Mandibles -- Previously seen by me rocking one hell of a stache in Quentin Dupieux's super fun 2018 flick Keep an Eye Out! (which I reviewed out of this exact same fest in 2019 right here) this movie has Ludig re-teaming with confirmed nutter Dupieux for a movie about two doofus low-lifes who find a scooter-sized housefly in the trunk of their stolen car, and train it to do crime. I don't think I've disliked a Dupieux flick yet? I am so on his wacky wavelength and this one is apparently one of his best.

Vincent Dedienne in Margaux Hartmann -- I actually don't think I know Dedienne from anything previous (nothing jumps off his IMDb page) but a quick google set me to attention; this is the flick that the fest's Guest of Honor Emmanuelle Béart stars in, and has her playing an older woman who's grieving her dead husband who goes back to school and makes new friends, with sexy results. I feel like you could add "with sexy results" to the description of any French film -- "Two low-lifes discover a gigantic housefly... with sexy results." Okay maybe not every French film. Anyway Dedienne is hella cute right?

Jérémie Renier in Slalom -- I have already posted about this movie! The shots of our beloved Renier doing his thing in this film (and by "his thing" I mean "getting naked" of course) made their way onto the internet back in October of last year, and obviously, just as we would with Jérémie, we jumped right on it. This movie has the legendary Belgian slash blond sexpot playing the creepy ski coach to a teen girl... and yes, "with sexy results" applies, although obviously that comes with several dozen asterisks given the subject matter.

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Phew! What a bunch, huh? "Rendez-Vous with French Cinema" runs on FLC's virtual platform from March 4th through 14th; tickets go on sale on February 19th (or earlier on Feb. 12th for FLC Members). You should have little fear that you won't hear more from me on this series, as I love covering it every year, so stay tuned. I'll throw their whole press release, with word on every single one of the films screening, right here after the jump...

Who Wore It Best?

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One of cinema's greatest current faces belongs to the French actor Pierre Niney. He was first brought to my attention thanks to the director François Ozon, that great wrangler of gallic faces, with 2016's Frantz. (Read my review here.) The latest issue of Citizen K magazine, seen above, is smartly taking full advantage of that face, swiping a page from the playbook of Jean-luc Godard's 1965 masterpiece Pierrot le Fou, which turned the also striking face (but for very different reasons) visage of movie legend Jean-Paul Belmondo that same bright shade of blue.

Pierre was kind enough to share a video of the shoot today via his Instagram, some of which I've giffed down below (just the blue-face parts!), but before we get to that I must naturally ask the obvious question...

find bike trails

And now you may hit the jump for those gifs...

Good Morning, World

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📸 👁 @natashaandrewshello

A post shared by Pierre Niney (@pierreniney) on Mar 5, 2019 at 10:32am PST

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Always here for Pierre Niney thirst trapping.

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Pierre Niney Seven Times

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I'm getting frustrated that Pierre Niney hasn't been cast in anything here in the US since Francois Ozon's Frantz came out a couple of years ago -- I know there's not a huge demand for wispy Frenchman with fancifully elongated features here in the US but there should be. Just think what Tim Burton could do with him! He'd fit in perfectly in that Dumbo trailer.  In related news I am now Pierre Niney's unofficial American representative, I guess? I expect my ten percent. Hit the jump for six more pictures...

Always Look on the Bright Side of Life

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There are a lot of shitty things about our present day and age but Pierre Niney Shirtless Selfies are not one of them pic.twitter.com/Am16S9B0WH

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) January 2, 2019

Today's Fanboy Delusion

Today I'd rather be...

... putting out fires with Pierre Niney.

Yes that's the wispy French actor Pierre Niney that we got to know with Francois Ozon's film Frantz -- he's gone and butched himself up for a fireman movie, giving me some serious "Keanu in Speed" vibes in the process...

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J-2 !!!

A post shared by Pierre Niney (@pierreniney) on Nov 26, 2018 at 11:09am PST

Pierre Niney One Time

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I won't have a proper "Best of 2017" list until god knows when, y'all know how I roll with such things (way behind the curve) but I was working on a list of the movies I have seen so far this year and I was reminded that Francois Ozon's Frantz totally counts, which is something I shouldn't have needed a reminder of - it should be showing up on people's lists, dammit. Anyway you should see Frantz if you haven't (here's my review) and there's a picture of the film's star half-naked beside a bookshelf because Merry Christmas to me. (click to embiggen)

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Pierre Niney Six Times

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Since we were just saying yesterday that "Tennis is the new Volcano" it seemed timely to show off this photo-shoot of the Frantz actor for GQ France (via) - sadly that's the only shot of him in tennis gear (no short shorts, for shame) but the rest of the shoot, which has him taking on a few different male movie screen personalities, is fun, so hit the jump for that...

All That Ozon Allows

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I can't remember what prompted the conversation I was having before the lights went down on Francois Ozon's new film Frantz, but for some reason the films of Merchant Ivory came up. It wasn't because I had Merchant-Ivorian expectations of Frantz - besides making a gif of the film's star Pierre Niney being his lanky sexy self in the trailer I had absolutely no idea what Frantz was or was about before going in. Even though I'm on the internet all day every day I've gotten pretty good at avoiding knowledge I don't want, as I figure it's best to go into some flicks with a clean, fresh brain, and I'd kept my brain good and fresh and clean for this one. 

So anyway me and my company at this Frantz screening were for some reason having nothing to do with Frantz talking about Merchant Ivory before Frantz started, and right before the lights went down I expressed a sorrow that nobody seems to make gorgeous, lyrical and literate movies like Merchant Ivory once did anymore. Little did I know I was just about to get one from Francois Ozon of all people!

That's not to say that Ozon was previously known for illiterate movies; we're not exactly talking about Michael Bay remaking Maurice here. (Oh my god that sentence just broke my head.) It's just he's never made anything quite this restrained and old-fashioned before - the scenery sweeps, the music swells, the color blossoms and blooms in romantic fits amid weepy war drama. Point being it is grand and lovely and sad in the sweetest most melancholy ways, and it was one of those moments when the world gives you exactly the gift you're asking for at exactly the right moment.

Ozon modernizes the Merchant Ivory in swell ways, too - it might be a chaste movie but his queer heart beats hard under all of those stiff uniforms. Fassbinderian flatness and absurdity peeks around every corner. Niney turns on a dime (he's as wide as a dime too) from romantically furrowed fawn, all single back hand to the forehead and feeling a faint coming on, to a irritatingly prissy aristocrat in exaggerated riding pants in the most marvelous of ways. meanwhile Paula Beer's a world-class discovery, lugging us around a bewildering historical and emotional melee so softly and sweetly it's as if we're on clouds. To watch these two dance over the ghosts of lost love is to hug history close, affectionately, and to long for more even as it pains us, wounds us, profoundly.

Francois Ozon talking FRANTZ #ozon #francoisozon #frantz @filmlinc #filmliveshere

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Pierre Niney Two Times

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Tickets went on sale today for the annually amazing "Rendezvous with French Cinema" series at FSLC -- if you missed our big post about it click right here. Niney is the star of Francois Ozon's new film Frantz, which is screening during the fest; you can watch the sexy trailer for Frantz right here. Can't wait!

5 Off My Head: French Kisses For Everybody

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Did that photograph of Raphaël Personnaz grab your attention? I feel as if that photograph of Raphaël Personnaz might've grabbed your attention. It grabs mine! And now that we're all good and grabbed, here's the good word - the ever wonderful Film Society of Lincoln Center here in NYC has just announced the full line-up for the annual awesomeness that is their "Rendezvous with French Cinema" series, and it's a doozy. You can see the entire line-up right here - it runs for the first two weeks of March - but I'm gonna highlight five titles that are grabbing me the hardest.

Frantz (Francois Ozon) - It's Ozon, period. I'm there. But I've been wanting to see Frantz for several months even besides, thanks to the trailer full of a shirtless mustachioed Pierre Niney running around. Watch the trailer here, with bonus gifs. 

And bonus: Niney also co-stars in the Closing Night film The Odyssey, which stars Lambert Wilson as Jacques Cousteau...

... Niney plays Lambert's son and Audrey Tatou plays his wife. The funny thing that made me laugh about this movie is I looked up its writer-director, a man named Jérôme Salle, to see what else he'd done and wham, even the director is hot:

I love the French. Anyway Salle will be there for a Q&A with The Odyssey, and Francios Ozon will be there for a Q&A with Frantz too.

Raw (Julia Ducournau) - This is the last title I expected to see popping up here in this series and I let out an audible gasp when it saw it was - this cannibal comedy has been making people literally pass out and get sick at film festivals for months now, so naturally I've been clamoring for it and clamoring for it. 

Nocturama (Bertrand Bonello) - I know a lot of people think that Bonello's last movie, 2014's fashion biopic Saint Laurent, is too long and self-indulgent, but I hate your dumb face if you think so - it's glorious. I saw it three times in the theater and I could've gone every night for a month. So whatever he did next I was gonna be excited about, but FSLC's write-up of this movie has got me literally goose-bumping. Let me just cut and paste because HELL YES:

"The audacious new film from Bertrand Bonello (Saint Laurent) unfolds in two mesmerizing segments. The first is a precision-crafted thriller, following a multi-ethnic group of millennial radicals as they carry out a mass-scale terrorist attack on Paris. The second—in which the perpetrators hide out in the consumerist mecca of a luxury department store—is the director’s coup, raising provocative questions about everything that came before. Bonello stages his apocalyptic vision with stylishly roving camerawork, blasts of hip-hop, and a lip-synced performance to Shirley Bassey’s “My Way.” This is edgy, risk-taking filmmaking that is sure to ignite debate. "

In the Forest of Siberia (Safy Nebbou) - And we get to Raphaël Personnaz, as promised! Raphaël, who we've been crushing on ever since we first saw him in a movie at the 2015 edition of Rendezvous (you'll really want to click on this link here because we have been thorough with our love), stars as a young dude who isolates himself in the wilderness... aka an excuse to stare at a man as gorgeous as Raphaël Personnaz framed against white snow while staring plaintively. I'm there. Oh and I should mention he also walks around the snow buck naked, as captured by us already in this post from October. Seeing that on the big screen? I'm REALLY there.

It's a shame I'm limiting myself to just five titles because there are even more I want to see -- Gaspard Ulliel in The Dancer! Marion Cotillard and Louis Garrel in From the Land of the Moon! Natalie Portman as a 1930s spiritualist in Planetarium!!! Basically just say goodbye to me for the first two weeks of March, is what I am saying.

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