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From the moment that Thomas Salvador’s The Mountain opens on robotic engineer Pierre (Salvador) standing in his modern Paris apartment sipping a morning espresso, we understand him to be a man unmoored. At work, as his attention trails off in the midst of a presentation, he seems every bit as lost as the stray deer that he later notices roaming the empty streets of a mountainside town. Throughout the film, Pierre will often stare off into the distance, as if looking for something—but good luck figuring out what that actually is.

The Mountain tracks Pierre’s day-to-day life of self-isolation with dry precision after he travels into the Alps for his work and decides to turn his back on his life in the city for good. But whatever motivation underpins his decision is as nebulous as the clouds over the mountains, as Salvador frustratingly never offers a concrete...

It’s been over a century since anyone’s adapted Wilkie Collins’ underrated “The New Magdalen” for the screen, and while Aurélia Georges’ cleverly modified version doesn’t resolve the novel’s inability to account for the protagonist’s mastery at disguising her working-class origins, its handsome imagery and Sabine Azéma’s adroit interpretation as the duped wealthy widow make “Secret Name” an attractive prospect for costume drama fans. The novel played on Victorian-era anxieties of class corruption with its story of a former prostitute assuming a dead high-bred woman’s identity only to discover that she wasn’t dead after all, but since subverting the social order no longer carries the same level of apprehension it did back then, the film foregrounds the ethical ramifications of impersonation and identity.

Georges (“The Girl and the River”) and her co-writer Maud Ameline seamlessly shift Collins’ action from the Franco-Prussian War to the First World War,...

La Place d’une autre Review — La Place d’une autre (2021) Film Review from the 74th Annual Locarno Film Festival, a film directed by Aurelia Georges, and starring Lyna Khoudri, Sabine Azema, Maud Wyler, Laurent Poitrenaux, Jacques Bachelier, Amelie Belohradsky, Agnes Bourgeois, Olivier Broche, Bruno Dreyfurst, Sarah Gendrot-Krauss, Jacques Bruckmann, Marie Hattermann, Naton Goetz, [...]

Continue reading: Film Review: LA Place D’Une Autre: An Excellent, Well Acted Story of Mistaken Identity [Locarno 2021]...

La Place d’une autre Review — La Place d’une autre (2021) Film Review from the 74th Annual Locarno Film Festival, a film directed by Aurelia Georges, and starring Lyna Khoudri, Sabine Azema, Maud Wyler, Laurent Poitrenaux, Jacques Bachelier, Amelie Belohradsky, Agnes Bourgeois, Olivier Broche, Bruno Dreyfurst, Sarah Gendrot-Krauss, Jacques Bruckmann, Marie Hattermann, Naton Goetz, [...]

Continue reading: Film Review: LA Place D’Une Autre: An Excellent, Well Acted Story of Mistaken Identity [Locarno 2021]...

The director is also part of the cast of this Christmas in July production that will be sold by Le Pacte, together with Louise Bourgoin, Martine Chevallier and Laurent Poitrenaux. The first clapperboard will slam on 3 May on La montagne, the second feature from Thomas Salvador after the well-received Vincent (in the New Directors competition at San Sebastián in 2014 and nominated for the 2016 Best Feature Debut Lumières award). The director will also head the cast, flanked by Louise Bourgoin, Martine Chevallier (winner of the 2021 Lumières award for Best Actress and nominated for the César award in the same category for Two of Us; soon in La Menace and Le bal des folles)...

La Place d’une autre (The Place of Another)

Director Aurélia Georges promises to be a breakout in 2021 with her third project La Place d’une autre (The Place of Another), produced by Olivier Père of Arte France Cinema and Emmanuel Barraux of 31 Juin Films. The projects stars Lyna Khoudri (Cesar Winner for Most Promising Newcomer in 2020 for Papicha) , Sabine Azema, Maud Wyler and Laurent Poitrenaux. The film is a loose adaptation of the Wilkie Collins novel The New Magdalen, penned by Georges and Maud Ameline. Georges competed in the Acid lineup with her 2007 debut L’Homme qui marche, where she returned with sophomore feature La fille at le fleuve in 2014.…...

The cast also includes Sabine Azéma, Maud Wyler and Laurent Poitrenaux. Produced by 31 Juin Films, this third feature from the director will be sold by Pyramide. Three more weeks of filming for Aurélia Georges’ La place d’une autre, the third feature from the director, after L'Homme qui marche (selected in the Acid competition in Cannes in 2007) and La fille et le fleuve (2014). The cast includes Lyna Khoudri, Sabine Azéma (winner of the Best Actress César award in 1985 and 1987 and nominated four other times), Maud Wyler (very well received in The Bare Necessity and a stand out in Alice and the Mayor) and Laurent Poitrenaux. Very freely...

The Slamdance Film Festival announced today their narrative and documentary feature film competition for its 24th Festival edition, taking place January 19-25, 2018 in Park City. Established in 1995 by a group of filmmakers whose work had been rejected by the Sundance Film Festival, Slamdance is dedicated to fostering a community for independent emerging artists, fashioning itself “the premiere film festival by filmmakers, for filmmakers.”

The feature competition includes 16 premieres, mostly produced in the U.S. All competition films are feature length directorial debuts with budgets of less than $1 million Usd, and without Us distribution. In addition, the festival announced a new partnership with alumni Anthony and Joe Russo (“Captain America: Civil War,” and “Avengers: Infinity War”) to establish the inaugural Russo Fellowship award. Every participating filmmaker will be eligible for a $25,000 cash prize and mentorship from the Russos in the development of the winner’s next project at the brothers’ Los Angeles studio.

To help sift through the increasing number of new releases (independent or otherwise), the Weekly Film Guide is here! Below you’ll find basic plot, personnel and cinema information for all of this week’s fresh offerings.

Starting this month, we’ve also put together a list for the entire month. We’ve included this week’s list below, complete with information on screening locations for films in limited release.

See More: Here Are All the Upcoming Movies in Theaters for July 2016

Here are the films opening theatrically in the U.S. the week of Friday, July 1. All synopses provided by distributor unless listed otherwise.

Wide

The Bfg

Director: Steven Spielberg

Cast: Bill Hader, Jemaine Clement, Mark Rylance, Penelope Wilton, Rebecca Hall, Ruby Barnhill

Synopsis: The Bfg is no ordinary bone-crunching giant. He is far too nice and jumbly. It’s lucky for Sophie that he is. Had she been...

Stars: Isabelle Carré, Andre Dussollier, Denis Lavant, Sergi López, Mathilde Monnier, Laurent Poitrenaux, Philippe Rebbot, Karin Viard | Written and Directed by Arnaud Larrieu & Jean-Marie Larrieu

Shortly after her estranged mother’s death, middle-aged Caroline travels to her palatial house in the country to settle affairs and bury her. She intends to stop for a night, attend the ceremony and head back to Paris the next day but her mother’s fun-loving friend Pattie, the local scoundrels, and a mysterious older man named Jean have other ideas – and that’s even before the body goes missing…

21 Nights with Pattie is all over the place tonally, dealing as it does in necrophilia, romantic frustration, parenthood, sexual liberation and ghosts dancing on tables, but it’s a more enjoyable ride than you might expect. Caroline is the nominal protagonist, trying to discover who (if anyone) took her mother’s body while getting to...

Director and star Mathieu Amalric in The Blue Room: "I thought a lot of the usual suspects. A man sitting and looking, and he is not listening."

Mathieu Amalric's The Blue Room (La Chambre Bleue) is based on Georges Simenon's novel. Amalric stars with Stéphanie Cléau, Léa Drucker with Serge Bozon, Mona Jaffart, Laurent Poitrenaux and Blutch in his whodunnit with a question mark for each molded part - the who, the done and especially the it.

David Lynch's Lost Highway - William Holden's death - Gene Hackman and Kevin Costner in Roger Donaldson's No Way Out form a thread. Katharine Hepburn on a ladder climbing up to Cary Grant in Howard Hawks' Bringing Up Baby, editing with François Gédigier and Bozon's voice are heard in part 2 of our conversation.

Anne-Katrin Titze: You mentioned how quickly Simenon wrote the book and you also said...

The Blue Room director Mathieu Amalric with Anne-Katrin Titze: "What is incredible is that, yes, the bee is in [George Simenon's] novel on the belly." Photo: Charlie Olsky

Mathieu Amalric's The Blue Room (La Chambre Bleue), based on Georges Simenon's novel, stars Stéphanie Cléau, Léa Drucker with Serge Bozon, Mona Jaffart, Laurent Poitrenaux and Blutch. Amalric recently starred with Emmanuelle Seigner in Roman Polanski's Venus in Fur.

The morning after the North American premiere at the New York Film Festival, we discussed Simenon's love of Stendahl, leaving a message for composer John Zorn, Katharine Hepburn on a ladder, adapting Eric Reinhardt for the stage, William Holden's death in connection to David Lynch, Gene Hackman and Kevin Costner, bees and shoes.

Léa Drucker as Delphine Gahyde

Vladimir Nabokov warned in Transparent Things "When we concentrate on a material object, whatever its situation, the very act of attention may...

The Blue Room (Le chamber bleue) Sundance Selects Reviewed for Shockya by Harvey Karten. Data-based on Rotten Tomatoes Grade: B+ Director: Mathieu Amalric Screenplay: Mathieu Amalric, Stéphanie Cléau, novel by George Simenon Cast: Mathieu Amalric, Léa Drucker Stéphanie Cléau, Laurent Poitrenaux, Serge Bozon, Blutch Screened at: Review 2, NYC, 9/18/14 Opens: October 3, 2014 In a recent episode on the Emmy-winning TV show “The Good Wife,” the lawyer played by Josh Charles is shot dead in the courtroom by his own client. Americans like jury trials with such melodrama. But the French, or at least the audience prepared for engaging fare that challenges the mind as well as the heart, [ Read More ]

The post The Blue Room Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.

• Lionsgate has purchased the North American rights for Dark Blood, the last film starring River Phoenix (My Own Private Idaho) before he passed away in 1993. Directed and written by George Sluizer (The Vanishing), the upcoming thriller follows the story of Boy (Phoenix), a young widower living as a hermit on a nuclear testing site in the desert. While traveling solo on his “second” honeymoon, Boy discovers a stranded Hollywood couple. Desiring the woman, Boy decides to hold them captive because he finds himself under the impression that he can create a better world with her. The upcoming drama, set to be released via VOD,...

Sundance Selects has picked up North American rights from producer Paolo Branco of Alfama Films to Mathieu Amalric’s Ucr selection The Blue Room.

Amalric and Stéphanie Cléau adapted the screenplay from Georges Simenon’s novel about a man who is mysteriously accused of something after he embarks on a series of trysts.

Amalric and Cléau star with Léa Drucker, Laurent Poitrenaux, Serge Bozon and Blutch.

“Mathieu Amalric is proving to be as formidable as a filmmaker as he is an actor,” said Sundance Selects/IFC Films president Jonathan Sehring. “This is a superlative film.”...

Sundance Selects has picked up North American rights from producer Paolo Branco of Alfama Films to Mathieu Amalric’s Ucr selection The Blue Room.

Amalric and Stéphanie Cléau adapted the screenplay from Georges Simenon’s novel about a man who is mysteriously accused of something after he embarks on a series of trysts.

Amalric and Cléau star with Léa Drucker, Laurent Poitrenaux, Serge Bozon and Blutch.

“Mathieu Amalric is proving to be as formidable as a filmmaker as he is an actor,” said Sundance Selects/IFC Films president Jonathan Sehring. “This is a superlative film.”...

Sundance Selects picked up North American rights to French director Mathieu Amalric's Cannes film The Blue Room. The movie, co-adapted by Amalric and Stéphanie Cléau from a novel by Georges Simenon, world premiered in the Un Certain Regard section of the festival. It stars Amalric, Cléau, Léa Drucker, Laurent Poitrenaux, Serge Bozon, and was produced by Paulo Branco. The film is described as a mysterious noir that follows a man and a woman as they meet in a hotel for trysts. In the afterglow, they share a few sweet nothings. At least the man seemed to believe they were

read more...

Watch a freshly cooked clip for Christian Vincent's Haute Cuisine, starring Catherine Frot, Arthur Dupont, Jean d'Ormesson, Hippolyte Girardot, Jean-Marc Roulot, Philippe Uchan, Laurent Poitrenaux and Hervé Pierre. The film opened this weekend (September 20th, 2013) via Weinstein Co, and is written by Etienne Comar and Vincent from the story by Danièle Mazet-Delpeuch. Hortense Laborie (Catherine Frot), a renowned chef from Perigord, is astonished when the President of the Republic (Jean d’Ormesson) appoints her his personal cook, responsible for creating all his meals at the Elysée Palace. Despite jealous resentment from the other kitchen staff, Hortense quickly establishes herself, thanks to her indomitable spirit.

Title: Haute Cuisine The Weinstein Company Director: Christian Vincent Screenwriter: Etienne Comar, Christian Vincent Cast: Catherine Frot, Arthur Dupont, Jean d’Ormesson, Hippolyte Girardot, Jean-Marc Roulot, Philippe Uchan, Laurent Poitrenaux, Hervé Pierre, Brice Fournier Screened at: Dolby24, NYC,9/10/13 Opens: September 20, 2013 If Hortense Laborie (Catherine Frot) knew that Bill Clinton would adopt a simple vegan diet she would be both disbelieving and horrified. Horrified. To her a diet is a disease, any diet, a point that has her quoting Montesquieu in Christian Vincent “Haute Cuisine” to the effect that, well, a diet is a disease. Watching her prepare dishes for the President of France she turns Hippocratus’s dictum “Let food [ Read More ]

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