News

French filmmakers Cedric Klapisch, Bertrand Bonello and Gilles Lellouche, and actors Laurent Lafitte, Romane Bohringer and Isabelle Carré, are among the more than 1,000 film and culture professionals and organisations who have signed an open letter warning of the dangers of a potential far-right government and its implications for the industry.

The open letter, published in Le Monde newspaper, and spearheaded by producers union the Arp, comes two weeks after French president Emmanuel Macron’s surprise decision for a snap election to elect a new National Assembly that will see voters head to the polls for a two-round process on June...

The letter targets “the political positions displayed by the Cannes Festival” in particular.

More than 123 French actors and actresses have signed an open letter denouncing sexual harassment in the French film industry, calling it “a dysfunctional system that crushes and annihilates”.

On the same day that Cannes welcomed Maïwenn’s Jeanne Du Barry and its star Johnny Depp, and just ahead of the premiere of Catherine Corsini’s Homecoming in competition, the letter targets “the political positions displayed by the Cannes Festival” in particular. “By rolling out the red carpet to men and women who assault, the festival sends the...

Petites Review — Petites (2022) Film Review from the 75th Annual Locarno Film Festival, a movie written and directed by Julie Lerat-Gersant, starring Romane Bohringer, Lauréna Thellier, Pili Groyne, Victoire Du Bois, Bilel Chegrani, and Wood Victory. The denial of medical care is a human rights violation, full stop, yet conservatives and misogynists alike still love to split [...]

Continue reading: Film Review: Petites: A Complex Look At Reproductive Rights and Unplanned Motherhood [Locarno 2022]...

Italy’s Satine Film has picked up Julie Lerat-Gersant’s Locarno Film Festival title “Little Ones” about teen pregnancy, Variety has learned in Locarno. In the past, the company has also released such titles as “Beasts of the Southern Wild” and Golden Bear winner “There Is No Evil.”

“We aim to discover and introduce visionary and courageous cinematographic voices from all over the world,” said Claudia Bedogni, Satine Film’s founder and managing director.

“The film struck me with its gentle but secure narration and captivating, emotional performances. It’s one of these rare gems where you feel tremendous empathy for the characters as if you were there with them, sharing the same sorrows and dilemmas,” she added. The company is hoping to encourage young audiences to watch the film. “We have done the same with Stéphane Demoustier’s ‘The Girl With a Bracelet,’ also acquired in Locarno, and it...

Stars: Nicolas Duvauchelle, Marilyn Lima, Romane Bohringer, Rossy De Palma, Tchéky Karyo | Written by Stéphane Landowski, Mathias Malzieu | Directed by Mathias Malzieu

If you follow me on Twitter or know me at all, you probably know that I’m not really a fan of romantic movies. That’s not to say I hate them, I’m just very choosy about which ones I watch because I know I’m not going to like the majority of them… However by being part of the Fantasia Festival meant that I would give A Mermaid In Paris a chance. I know the festival is full of original and entertaining films, and this one looked no different.

In it, we see Gaspard (Nicolas Duvauchelle) save an injured mermaid, Lula (Marilyn Lima) and take her to his home to his bath tub to heal. Gaspard has had his heartbroken on too many occasions and believes he will never love again,...

Stars: Vanessa Paradis, Nicolas Maury, Kate Moran, Jonathan Genet, Félix Maritaud, Khaled Alouach, Noé Hernández, Thibault Servière, Bertrand Mandico, Bastien Waultier, Romane Bohringer, Dourane Fall, Jules Ritmanic | Written by Yann Gonzalez, Cristiano Mangione | Directed by Yann Gonzalez

Knife+Heart (Un couteau dans le cœur) is a French 80s cinematic throwback directed by Yann Gonzalez. The film is set during 1979 in Paris and follows Anna (Vanessa Paradis) a gay porn producer who is recovering from heartbreak with romantic partner Lois (Kate Moran) when a mysterious killer begins to pick off Anne’s male talent one by one.

Variety describes Yann Gonzalez film as “unabashedly queer”, and you could not argue against a single letter in that description. Knife+Heart is incessantly provocative, too much at times, from its neon-lit opening to its apathetic climax. A stylish satirical feature that finds any form of over theatricality intensifies such and indulges to a sickly humorous extent.

Other Angle has picked up international sales rights to “A Good Doctor” with Michel Blanc, “Just The Three of Us” with Catherine Frot, and “The Father Figure” in the run-up to the UniFrance’s Rendez-Vous in Paris.

Directed by Eric Besnard, “The Father Figure” is a supernatural comedy drama following a writer who mourns the death of his father and starts seeing him reappear; but he turns out to be the only one able to see him. The film stars François Berleand, Guillaume de Tonquedec and Josiane Balasko.

“Just the Three of Us,” which marks the feature debut of José Alcala, is a love-triangle comedy starring Daniel Auteuil and Catherine Frot. Auteuil stars a man on a mission to get his wife back after she leaves him for another man. Both “The Father Figure” and “Just The Three of Us” will be released by Apollo Films in France.

“A Good Doctor,...

Danish director Lars von Trier is returning to the Cannes fold with his serial-killer drama “The House That Jack Built” after seven years of banishment from the festival, while Terry Gilliam’s long-gestating, problem-plagued “The Man Who Killed Don Quixote” is set to close the event, organizers announced Thursday. Both films will screen out of competition.

Cannes also added two sophomore outings to the competition lineup – Yann Gonzalez’s “Knife + Heart” and Sergei Dvortsevoy’s “The Little One” – plus Palme d’Or winning filmmaker Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s “The Wild Pear Tree.” “Whitney,” Kevin Macdonald’s documentary on singer Whitney Houston, has been set as a Midnight Screening, as has HBO’s new adaptation of “Fahrenheit 451,” directed by Ramin Bahrani and starring Michael B. Jordan and Michael Shannon – the latest television project to screen at Cannes.

Artistic director Thierry Fremaux had hinted that von Trier would return to the...

Dalibor Matanic’s The High Sun wins hat trick at Cottbus.

Croatia was the big winner at the 25th edition of FilmFestival Cottbus (Nov 3-8) with Dalibor Matanić’s The High Sun taking home three awards, including the Main Prize and Fipresci Prize.

The €25,000 Main Prize was shared equally between Matanić and his producer Ankica Jurić Tilić for the Croatian-Slovenian-Serbian co-production which had its world premiere in San Sebastian in September.

The film’s actress Tihana Lazović was in Cottbus to accept the Main Prize on behalf of Matanić and Tilić, and subsequently picked up the €5,000 Special Prize for Best Actress for her portrayal of three women in three consecutive decades.

The High Sun premiered in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard sidebar where it won the Jury Prize; international sales are handled by Cercamon World Sales for the film which is now Croatia’s submission for the Foreign-Language Film Oscar.

Meanwhile, another Croatian...

Squeezed between his lavishly received, Sundance preemed docu-portrait of zoo life in Bestiaire, and Joy of Man’s Desiring, a genre blending meditation on factory work which had its debut at this year’s Berlin Film Festival, Canadian auteur Denis Côté took home the Alfred Bauer Award from the Berlinale last year for his latest work of intricately haunting fiction, Vic + Flo Saw A Bear. It seems the stark visual sense found in Côté’s documentary work has carried over to his latest narrative. Squarely framed against spare backdrops within the rural cabin they’ve shacked up in, Pierrette Robitaille and Romane Bohringer, who play middle-aged lesbian ex-con couple Vic and Flo, respectively, are trying their hand at the monotony of a normal life, but sooner than later they swiftly find that they can not for all their efforts escape the horrors of one’s past.

Côté’s interests lie...

Georgia was the big winner at the 18th edition of the Sofia International Film Festival (Siff) which closed at the weekend with the Grand Prix for Best Film and Best Director award going to Levan Koguashvili’s second feature Blind Dates.

The melancholic comedy, which premiered at the Berlinale’s Forum last month, also received the Fipresci International Film Critics’ Prize. Handled internationally by Films Boutique, it is already booked to screen at the April festivals in Wiesbaden (goEast) and Lecce and in Odessa in July.

Presenting the Grand Prix to Koguashvili, the International Jury’s president producer Alexander Rodnyansky said that the jury’s discussion on the top prize had ¨lasted only about 10 minutes and was unanimous. This film has become the absolute winner of this festival!¨

In addition, Vladimer Katcharava of Tbilisi-based 20 Steps Production received the Sofia Meetings’ €10,000 Digimage - Lvt Postproduction Award for Miriam Khachvani’s Dede which he pitched in the Plus Minus...

With the dust fully settled on the Academy Awards, we point our attention northward with tonight’s 2014 Canadian Screen Awards. Many of the television winners have already been announced in glitzy fashion during this Canadian Screen Week, but with baited breath, we’re more keen on seeing how the film award honors will pan out. Last year’s Tiff saw Denis Villeneuve bring not one (Prisoners), but a pair of feature films and it is the offbeat, doppelgänger delight Enemy that should reap in the top awards of the evening. Here are my predictions of who will win, who should win, and who should have been nominated in each of the most anticipated film categories.

Best Motion Picture:

The nominees are: Enemy, The Dismantlement, Empire of Dirt, The F Word, Gabrielle, The Grand Seduction, Maina, Tom at the Farm

Screenie voters tend to favor Canada’s yearly submission for the...

Pierrette Robitaille and Romane Bohringer in Vic + Flo Saw A Bear Denis Côté's Vic + Flo Saw A Bear tells the story of ex-con Victoria's (Pierrette Robitaille) attempts to retreat from the dangers she perceives in the world, only to find that the past of her lesbian lover Florence (Romane Bohringer) holds an even greater world of threat. The film opens in at Anthology Film Archives in New York on February 7 and ahead of the release we caught up with Côté to chat about its shifting tones, strong subject matter - and why his films talk about the director himself.

Your films frequently contain very striking female characters - and in the case of Vic + Flo Saw A Bear there are three of them, with the men falling firmly in their shadow. Could you tell us a bit about that choice? Do you think that female protagonists offer you more scope than male ones?...

The tendency of violence to beget more violence has been the concern of artists since long before Aeschylus wrote about Orestes, who killed his mother for killing his father for killing his sister. Quebec–based Denis Côté's brutal fable Vic + Flo Saw a Bear is similarly preoccupied by violence's terrible fecundity, and this exceptional French-language film's strongest elements are borrowed from Greek tragedy. It's an ominous, claustrophobic, unhappily sapphic work whose thunderclap of a climax instills terror and awe of the fates' petty, whimsical cruelties.

Vic and Flo are Victoria (Pierrette Robitaille) and Florence (Romane Bohringer), a lesbian couple reunited after 61-year-old Vic's release from jail. (Her crime is never revealed, but she receiv...

★★★☆☆ Winner of the Silver Bear at this year's Berlin Film Festival, arch provocateur Denis Cote's Vic + Flo Saw a Bear (2013) is a fascinating experiment in genre and narrative expectation. Elevated by sterling composition and framing, it's a playful, intelligent work in which the formal elegance conceals its prankster ambitions. Though many will be repelled by the blatant traces of the technical cogs at work, adventurous cinephiles will find it a tricksy, unexpected delight. Provided viewers make the necessary leap of faith, its twists and turns will keep them on their toes throughout the film's lean running time.

We're introduced to the titular Vic (Pierrette Robitaille) as she moves to a remote part of the Canadian woods to care for her ailing father, much to the chagrin of the locals who have been looking after him for years. The situation is further complicated by the arrival of Vic's younger, more outgoing...

Catherine Deneuve: Style, beauty, and talent on TCM tonight A day to rejoice on Turner Classic Movies: Catherine Deneuve, one of the few true Living Film Legends, is TCM’s "Summer Under the Stars" star today, August 12, 2013. Catherine Deneuve is not only one of the most beautiful film actresses ever, she’s also one of the very best. In fact, the more mature her looks, the more fascinating she has become. Though, admittedly, Deneuve has always been great to look at, and she has been a mesmerizing screen presence since at least the early ’80s. ‘The Umbrellas of Cherbourg’: One of the greatest movie musicals ever Right now, TCM is showing one of the greatest movie musicals ever made, Jacques Demy’s Palme d’Or winner The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964), in which a very blonde, very young, very pretty, and very dubbed Catherine Deneuve (singing voice by Danielle Licari...

Title: Renoir Samuel Goldwyn Films Director: Gilles Bourdos Screenwriter: Jerome Tonnerre, Gilles Bourdos, Michel Spinosa, based on the book “Le Tableau armoureux” by Jacques Renoir Cast: Michel Bouquet, Christa Théret, Vincent Rottiers, Thomas Doret, Romane Bohringer Screened at: Review 2, NYC, 3/21/13 Opens: March 29, 2013 A small percentage of the world’s people have a talent so immense that the rest of us may wonder what goes on in their personal lives to shape their avocations. Many in this elite circle may have unexceptional lives not worthy of the interest of a biographer, a novelist of a filmmaker. Not so Pierre-August Renoir, who may have been genetically privileged to be [ Read More ]

The post Renoir Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.

Tags: Morning BrewPortlandiaCarrie BrownsteinChloe SevignyFortune FeimsterAfter LatelyRachel MaddowPatti StangerShonda RhimesVic and Flo Saw a BearIMDb

Good morning! Happy Monday!

A film called Vic and Flo Saw a Bear follows French actresses Pierrette Robitaille and Romane Bohringer as lovers who are also ex-convicts. The drama follows the women as they are released from prison and attempt to live normal lives, despite the presence of parole officers. It won the Alfred Bauer Prize at Berlinale this week, and sounds like it might have a bit of comedy to it, despite being referred to as melodramatic.

On Friday's episode of Portlandia, both Carrie Brownstein and Fred Armisen fall in love with and start dating their roommate, played by Chloe Sevigny. What you really need to know about this is that Carrie and Chloe make out. Thank you, IFC. Thank you.

So apparently Patti Stanger (aka The Millionaire Matchmaker) was once "a lesbian for a year.

Berlin 2013: Best Director David Gordon Green This year's Best Director at the Berlinale was David Gordon Green for Prince Avalanche, featuring Paul Rudd and Emile Hirsch as two quite disparate road workers who develop an unlikely friendship. Green also wrote the Prince Avalanche screenplay, from an original story by Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurðsson. (Pictured above: David Gordon Green.) Best Actress Paulina Garcia Best Actress winner Paulina Garcia (pictured above holding her Silver Bear) is the star of Sebastián Lelio's dramatic comedy Gloria, which follows a middle-aged woman who rediscovers love in the person of a naval officer in his mid-60s. Roadside Attractions will handle the distribution of the well-liked Gloria in the U.S. Iranian dissident Jafar Panahi receives award The Best Screenplay prize went to Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi and Kamboziya Partovi for the narrative drama Closed Curtain. While accepting the award, Partovi told the audience that...

Vic & Flo ont vu un ours

Director/Writer: Denis Côté

Producer(s): Metafilms’ Sylvain Corbeil, Stéphanie Morissette (Camion)

U.S. Distributor: Rights Available

Cast: Marc-André Grondin, Romane Bohringer, Marie Brassard, Pierrette Robitaille

Ever since his docu-like essay in 2005′s Les états nordiques, Denis Côté has treated us to a body of minimalist work that defies classification with his last item Bestiaire (Sundance, Tiff) best exemplifying his preference for unique observational points and for fringe characters (this case it’s animals, but his other films are populated with the exotic of the human kind). While his 7th film is looking to be his most accessible yet (in the realms of Curling), which comparatively means its still counter-flow to the norm, this will surely have dna from his previous films (offbeat characters enclosed in natural spaces).

Gist: This is the portrait of two recently released prisoners (Pierrette Robitaille and Romane Bohringer...

Gilles Bourdos' Renoir romance goes to Samuel Goldwyn Films for U.S. distribution The official selection at this year's Cannes Film Festival, playing on Friday night in Un Certain Regard, will be sent out by Goldwyn spring 2013, reports Variety. Directed by Gilles Bourdos, Renoir stars Michel Bouquet, Romane Bohringer and Thomas Doret, and is set in the Côte d'Azur in 1915. Pierre-Auguste Renoir's is suffering from the loss of his wife, as well as news of his con being wounded in action. However, when a young girl comes into the picture, the painter in his twilight years has a spark of new energy, which inspired some of his best work including The Bathers ("Les baigneuses).

Gilles Bourdos' Renoir romance goes to Samuel Goldwyn Films for U.S. distribution The official selection at this year's Cannes Film Festival, playing on Friday night in Un Certain Regard, will be sent out by Goldwyn spring 2013, reports Variety. Directed by Gilles Bourdos, Renoir stars Michel Bouquet, Romane Bohringer and Thomas Doret, and is set in the Côte d'Azur in 1915. Pierre-Auguste Renoir's is suffering from the loss of his wife, as well as news of his con being wounded in action. However, when a young girl comes into the picture, the painter in his twilight years has a spark of new energy, which inspired some of his best work including The Bathers ("Les baigneuses).

French film director and close associate of François Truffaut

The film director Claude Miller, who has died aged 70 after a long illness, was continually dogged by comparisons to his friend and mentor François Truffaut. Hardly a review of his films failed to mention Truffaut in some way or another. This came about for various reasons. Miller was Truffaut's production manager on several occasions and made subtle references to the older director's work in many of his own films, almost always mentioning him in interviews. He had a small role in Truffaut's L'Enfant Sauvage (The Wild Child, 1970) and adapted La Petite Voleuse (The Little Thief, 1988) from a 30-page screenplay that Truffaut had written a few years before his death.

When Truffaut was once asked whether he had started a school of directors, he denied it. "These people are more influenced by other directors than myself. If Claude Miller has points in common with me,...

Being a movie enthusiast can be depressing for women, especially when "majors" believe they only adore romantic films and, to a lesser extent, comedies. Despite a few plot holes, Le bal des actrices is worth your time. In fact, the film tries - by taking the form of a documentary - its best to address the difficulties that actresses face in the movie industry.

A female movie director (Maïwenn Le Besco) is making a documentary about what it means to be an actress in France with an Hdv camera. In the process, Maïwenn conducts interviews actresses that are either well-known, more or less known and unknown.

Mélanie Doutey, a blockbuster actress, receives a lot of script to read, clothes/jewels from fashion companies (ex: Chanel) to wear at big-shot events and deals from magazines that want to put her face (note from the editor: and what a lovely one!) on their cover.

DVD Playhouse—October 2009

By

Allen Gardner

The Wizard Of Oz 70th Anniversary Ultimate Collector’S Edition (Warner Bros.) A true highlight in digital restoration technology, Warner Bros. restoration of the 1939 classic is cause for celebration. The Technicolor of the late ‘30s looks as though it was shot yesterday, and is especially stunning on Blu-ray, which was produced by scanning each of the film’s original Technicolor camera negatives using 8K resolution. From this scan, a final “capture” master was created in 4K, yielding twice the resolution seen in the master utilized for the film’s previous DVD release. Judy Garland’s Dorothy is charming as ever, and the entire cast: Ray Bolger, Bert Lahr, Jack Haley and Margaret Hamilton as the Wicked Witch, are all stellar. Four disc set bonuses include: Sing-along track; Documentaries and featurettes; Two 1914 silent films produced by Oz author L. Frank Baum, based on his stories...

Paris -- Harrison Ford, Robin Wright Penn and Andy Garcia are among the famous faces set for career tributes during the star-spangled 35th edition of the Deauville Festival of American Cinema.

Ford will be the guest of honor at Deauville, which kicks off on Sept. 4 in the Normandy seaside town. The fest also plans homages to Garcia, whose film "City Island" from Raymond de Felitta will screen at the fest, and Wright Penn, whose "Private Lives of Pippa Lee" will unspool out of competition.

Deauville also will pay homage to the late director-producer Robert Aldrich and will honor the careers of directors-screenwriters-producers David Zucker, Jim Abrahams and Jerry Zucker.

Nine films will compete for the event's top prizes, four of which are first features, namely Oren Moverman's "The Messenger," Cary Joji Fukunaga's "Sin Nombre," Daniel Davila's "Harrison, Montgomery" and Sophie Barthes' "Cold Souls" starring Paul Giamatti and Emily Watson.

Next week blogging will return to normal but this weekend I'm mostly offline. That's normally hard for me (My name is Nathaniel and I'm an internet addict) but this wedding weekend is such a blast that I haven't much though of movies... except for when we passed the Alamo Ritz earlier.

Before I left I took in my last Tribeca film, All About Actresses [Q & A] which is a French mockumentary about actresses and their neurosis. The actresses play themselves... but comedic false versions of themselves. The writer/director/star Maïwenn looked So familiar to me and I just couldn't place her. This is what IMDb is for. Turns out she played the diva Plavalaguna in The Fifth Element. Well, how about that? I always loved her scene in that movie. Her new film is... unusual... but despite my francophilia, I feel like more knowledge of French cinema would have definitely helped...

Sometimes an import can gain something in translation. Case in point: “March of the Penguins,” the smartly Americanized edition of the breathtakingly beautiful nature docu reviewed by Variety in French-lingo version under its original title — “The Emperor’s Journey” (“La Marche de l’empereur”) — at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. Aimed squarely at auds that flocked to “Winged Migration,” fascinating pic about penguin mating rituals could waddle through leggy summer run with savvy marketing in limited release.

Helmer Luc Jacquet originally used an anthropomorphic approach while dramatizing the procreation cycle of emperor penguins in frigid Antarctica icescapes. Specifically, he focused on a single couple out of thousands, “individualizing” the pair by employing actors Romane Bohringer and Charles Berling to voice the penguins murmuring sweet nothings to each other. (Jules Sitruk voiced their eventual offspring.)

Revised version prepared for co-release by Warner Independent Pictures and National Geographic Feature Films is more traditionally objective,...

Director Olivier Dahan made a big impression with his first full-length feature, a film noir entitled "Already Dead". His eagerly awaited second movie, "Le Petit Poucet" ("Tom Thumb"), moves from one genre to another. This time he has made a horror movie, but a horror movie with a twist -- it is seemingly aimed at children.

"Le Petit Poucet" is based on a children's story by Charles Perrault, but moviegoers expecting a Disney-like tale of simple folk will be sorely disappointed. The movie opened strongly with more than 50,000 admissions on the first day with audiences undoubtedly drawn by the glittering cast of Catherine Deneuve, Romane Bohringer and Samy Naceri.

Poucet (Nils Hugon) is the youngest of five brothers born to a desperately poor peasant family. The mother (Bohringer) and father (Pierre Berriau) struggle to feed the family. Then war is declared and all food is requisitioned, first by the enemy and then by the government.

The parents decide they would rather leave the children to fend for themselves in the forest than watch them die of hunger. Poucet overhears their plan and manages to save his brothers by leaving a trail they follow back home. A second attempt at abandoning the children is more successful and Poucet and his brothers are caught up in a spine-chilling adventure that includes baying wolves and a child-eating ogre. This being a fairy-tale, the ending is predictably happy ever after, but not before an average 6-year-old will be screaming to go home.

Dahan shot the movie entirely in the studio, doing his best to create a somber mood. This is a twilight world never troubled with sunlight. The sky is either slate gray or blood red and the forest is a mist-soaked, foreboding place.

Into this hellish existence, Dahan drops two horrific characters: a soldier with an iron leg (Naceri), who wants to burn the children to death on a bonfire, and a seven-foot tall-ogre (Dominque Hulin) who wears an iron mask with huge metal fangs.

Classic children's stories are no stranger to frightening characters and base their very existence on a panoply of witches, giants, ogres and wolves. But there is a huge difference between fear and terror. "Le Petit Poucet" relies heavily on well-honed, horror-movie techniques. In one scene, where the ogre stabs his own daughters to death, the shot of the flashing knife is accompanied by a pastiche of the music from the shower scene in Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho". Dahan demands of a young audience a maturity and sophistication that is beyond their capabilities.

The younger members of the cast perform well and appear suitably terrified, although one asks just how much of this is due to their acting ability. The adult actors are required to do very little and are often upstaged by costumes and makeup. Dahan would have done well to pay less attention to form and more to content.

LE PETIT POUCET

La Chauve-Souris

Producer: Eric Neve

Director: Olivier Dahan

Writers: Olivier Dahan, Agnes Fustier-Dahan

Music: Joe Hisaishi

Set designer: Michel Barthelemy

Costume designer: Gigi Lepage

Editor: Juliette Welfling

Stereo/color

Cast:

Poucet: Nils Hugon

Rose: Hanna Berthault

Poucet's mother: Romane Bohringer

Poucet's father: Pierre Berriau

Ogre: Dominque Hulin

Ogre's wife: Elodie Bouchez

Soldier with iron leg: Samy Naceri

The Queen: Catherine Deneuve

Running time -- 90 minutes

No MPPA rating...

With a title like "He Died With a Felafel in His Hand," and Richard Lowenstein, director of 1986's offbeat "Dogs in Space", at the helm, could this film be headed anywhere else than directly for cult status?

After directing several award-winning videos for the rock band INXS, Lowenstein knows his way around wild subject matter. The film is based on John Birmingham's highly popular book about share-housing, based on his experiences of living in dozens of houses with dozens of people throughout Australia.

Driven by absurdist humor, random off-the-wall moments of originality and a generally anarchic tone, "He Died With a Felafel" mixes the heightened silliness of youth cinema with a more studied, film-literate approach.

It's the type of film that should click with festival audiences looking for a comedic shot in the arm among the usually more serious offerings. The fact that the film also drops references to all kinds of elements of popular culture, as well as several cinematic icons (such as Jean-Luc Godard and Hal Hartley), should make it a hit with serious film enthusiasts looking to spot the influences, too.

The oddball aesthetic, combined with its left-of-center cast, might deter mainstream audiences from embracing the Australian offering, but those who like their cinema on the edge should find a lot to enjoy here.

Danny, a fine study in comedic reserve by Noah Taylor ("Lara Croft: Tomb Raider", "Almost Famous"), is trapped in share-house hell. He moves from house to house, sharing space with people he hardly knows, watching his life slowly unravel.

It doesn't help that the same eccentrics keep following him from city to city: the boyishly sexy Sam (fresh-faced newcomer Emily Hamilton), French anarchist Anya (a very impressive Romane Bohringer) and drug-addled Flip (Brett Stewart).

But when he hits Sydney, and shares house with a bitter homosexual and a society bitch (Francis McMahon and Sophie Lee, respectively, are both sidesplittingly hilarious), Danny's rambling life finally catches up with him.

Lowenstein fills the screen with vivid imagery and even more vivid characters and manages to hold them back from overstepping the mark and falling headlong into complete absurdity. It's a risky ploy, but one that works. "He Died With a Felafel" walks on the right side of the fine line between being a charming mess and a total shambles.

HE DIED WITH A FELAFEL IN HIS HAND

The Australian Film Finance Corp.

presents in association with Fandango and

the New South Wales Film and Television Office

a Notorious Films production

Producers: Andrew McPhail, Domenico Procacci

Director: Richard Lowenstein

Screenwriter: Richard Lowenstein

Based on the book by: John Birmingham

Director of photography: Andrew De Groot

Production designer: Ian Aitken

Editor: Richard Lowenstein

Costume designer: Meg Gordon

Stereo/color

Cast:

Danny: Noah Taylor

Sam: Emily Hamilton

Anya: Romane Bohringer

Taylor: Alex Menglet

Nina: Sophie Lee

Flip: Brett Stewart

Milo: Damian Walshe-Howling

Otis: Torquil Nelson

Running time -- 107 minutes

No MPAA rating...

Director Olivier Dahan made a big impression with his first full-length feature, a film noir entitled "Already Dead". His eagerly awaited second movie, "Le Petit Poucet" ("Tom Thumb"), moves from one genre to another. This time he has made a horror movie, but a horror movie with a twist -- it is seemingly aimed at children.

"Le Petit Poucet" is based on a children's story by Charles Perrault, but moviegoers expecting a Disney-like tale of simple folk will be sorely disappointed. The movie opened strongly with more than 50,000 admissions on the first day with audiences undoubtedly drawn by the glittering cast of Catherine Deneuve, Romane Bohringer and Samy Naceri.

Poucet (Nils Hugon) is the youngest of five brothers born to a desperately poor peasant family. The mother (Bohringer) and father (Pierre Berriau) struggle to feed the family. Then war is declared and all food is requisitioned, first by the enemy and then by the government.

The parents decide they would rather leave the children to fend for themselves in the forest than watch them die of hunger. Poucet overhears their plan and manages to save his brothers by leaving a trail they follow back home. A second attempt at abandoning the children is more successful and Poucet and his brothers are caught up in a spine-chilling adventure that includes baying wolves and a child-eating ogre. This being a fairy-tale, the ending is predictably happy ever after, but not before an average 6-year-old will be screaming to go home.

Dahan shot the movie entirely in the studio, doing his best to create a somber mood. This is a twilight world never troubled with sunlight. The sky is either slate gray or blood red and the forest is a mist-soaked, foreboding place.

Into this hellish existence, Dahan drops two horrific characters: a soldier with an iron leg (Naceri), who wants to burn the children to death on a bonfire, and a seven-foot tall-ogre (Dominque Hulin) who wears an iron mask with huge metal fangs.

Classic children's stories are no stranger to frightening characters and base their very existence on a panoply of witches, giants, ogres and wolves. But there is a huge difference between fear and terror. "Le Petit Poucet" relies heavily on well-honed, horror-movie techniques. In one scene, where the ogre stabs his own daughters to death, the shot of the flashing knife is accompanied by a pastiche of the music from the shower scene in Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho". Dahan demands of a young audience a maturity and sophistication that is beyond their capabilities.

The younger members of the cast perform well and appear suitably terrified, although one asks just how much of this is due to their acting ability. The adult actors are required to do very little and are often upstaged by costumes and makeup. Dahan would have done well to pay less attention to form and more to content.

LE PETIT POUCET

La Chauve-Souris

Producer: Eric Neve

Director: Olivier Dahan

Writers: Olivier Dahan, Agnes Fustier-Dahan

Music: Joe Hisaishi

Set designer: Michel Barthelemy

Costume designer: Gigi Lepage

Editor: Juliette Welfling

Stereo/color

Cast:

Poucet: Nils Hugon

Rose: Hanna Berthault

Poucet's mother: Romane Bohringer

Poucet's father: Pierre Berriau

Ogre: Dominque Hulin

Ogre's wife: Elodie Bouchez

Soldier with iron leg: Samy Naceri

The Queen: Catherine Deneuve

Running time -- 90 minutes

No MPPA rating...

With a title like "He Died With a Felafel in His Hand," and Richard Lowenstein, director of 1986's offbeat "Dogs in Space", at the helm, could this film be headed anywhere else than directly for cult status?

After directing several award-winning videos for the rock band INXS, Lowenstein knows his way around wild subject matter. The film is based on John Birmingham's highly popular book about share-housing, based on his experiences of living in dozens of houses with dozens of people throughout Australia.

Driven by absurdist humor, random off-the-wall moments of originality and a generally anarchic tone, "He Died With a Felafel" mixes the heightened silliness of youth cinema with a more studied, film-literate approach.

It's the type of film that should click with festival audiences looking for a comedic shot in the arm among the usually more serious offerings. The fact that the film also drops references to all kinds of elements of popular culture, as well as several cinematic icons (such as Jean-Luc Godard and Hal Hartley), should make it a hit with serious film enthusiasts looking to spot the influences, too.

The oddball aesthetic, combined with its left-of-center cast, might deter mainstream audiences from embracing the Australian offering, but those who like their cinema on the edge should find a lot to enjoy here.

Danny, a fine study in comedic reserve by Noah Taylor ("Lara Croft: Tomb Raider", "Almost Famous"), is trapped in share-house hell. He moves from house to house, sharing space with people he hardly knows, watching his life slowly unravel.

It doesn't help that the same eccentrics keep following him from city to city: the boyishly sexy Sam (fresh-faced newcomer Emily Hamilton), French anarchist Anya (a very impressive Romane Bohringer) and drug-addled Flip (Brett Stewart).

But when he hits Sydney, and shares house with a bitter homosexual and a society bitch (Francis McMahon and Sophie Lee, respectively, are both sidesplittingly hilarious), Danny's rambling life finally catches up with him.

Lowenstein fills the screen with vivid imagery and even more vivid characters and manages to hold them back from overstepping the mark and falling headlong into complete absurdity. It's a risky ploy, but one that works. "He Died With a Felafel" walks on the right side of the fine line between being a charming mess and a total shambles.

HE DIED WITH A FELAFEL IN HIS HAND

The Australian Film Finance Corp.

presents in association with Fandango and

the New South Wales Film and Television Office

a Notorious Films production

Producers: Andrew McPhail, Domenico Procacci

Director: Richard Lowenstein

Screenwriter: Richard Lowenstein

Based on the book by: John Birmingham

Director of photography: Andrew De Groot

Production designer: Ian Aitken

Editor: Richard Lowenstein

Costume designer: Meg Gordon

Stereo/color

Cast:

Danny: Noah Taylor

Sam: Emily Hamilton

Anya: Romane Bohringer

Taylor: Alex Menglet

Nina: Sophie Lee

Flip: Brett Stewart

Milo: Damian Walshe-Howling

Otis: Torquil Nelson

Running time -- 107 minutes

No MPAA rating...

British actress Janet McTeer never wants to see sand again after spending six weeks in the Namibian desert and going through hundreds of contact lenses. The Oscar-nominated Tumbleweeds star admits she and her The King Is Alive co-stars, including Jennifer Jason Leigh and French actress Romane Bohringer, were on the verge of going stir crazy in remote African mining town Kolmanskop because beautiful sunsets are only beautiful if you can see them. McTeer explains, "We got pretty sick of the sand and the wind. Together they ruined many a pair of contact lenses. Every day you went through two pairs." The cast also found themselves acting in a sandstorm, and had to endure the basics but the natural wonders around them made the experience worthwhile. McTeer adds, "There was nothing to do. There was a television but it didn't work and the telephone was too expensive. The production team had bought us a video machine and a whole bunch of videos we could watch but we didn't really bother. We all got into the whole sort of, `We're here, let's just go and watch the sunset.' Everything was much slower."...

Screening tonight at the Los Angeles Film Festival and opening Friday in New York (and May 11 in Los Angeles), "The King Is Alive" is a high-minded project that never lifts off as intended despite all the right elements seemingly coming together.

Boasting a strong international cast including Bruce Davison, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Janet McTeer and David Bradley, the IFC Films release could have used some Bunuelean black comedy to spice up the dreary tale of 10 hapless American and European tourists stranded in an African desert ? with beautiful dunes and abandoned mine buildings in Namibia standing in for a nameless North African locale.

A film with verve and conviction "by" Dogme 95 co-founder Kristian Levring ? who adheres more or less to the movement?s "vow of chastity" that calls for natural lighting, hand-held camerawork, no optical work or filters, etc. ? "King" has a premise that falls into the general migration of jaded Western artistic souls away from glossy visions of capitalist culture.

At the core of the film is an attempt by the increasingly worried and deteriorating characters to perform "King Lear" as scratched on paper from memory by one (Bradley) of their group.

In other words, it?s "Survivor" with a classy agenda, real actors and a few deaths to spice things up. But Dogme 95 flicks and "reality" TV shows have not swept away all other culture just yet, thankfully. As a story, "King" is jagged and underwhelming. There?s nothing inherently gratifying about watching a group of civilized people turn into brutes and pathetic victims of fate. As a sun-scorched rumination on the themes of "Lear", the movie can?t pull it off literally.

The setup has a rickety old bus driven by lost Moses (Vusi Kunene) running out of gas in the middle of nowhere. Several couples and lone travelers get out and seek shelter in derelict structures watched over by a desert-loving local (Peter Kubheka), who provides a poetic narration throughout. One experienced bloke (Miles Anderson) offers to go find help but warns of the danger they all face. Expecting to be back in five days, he sets off, and the others slowly starve, stand around in the sun and act foolishly, with the Bard to keep them sane.

Alas, Lear loses his reason and "King" gets blinded and lost in its wilderness of characters one doesn?t know or care much about. By the time Leigh?s desperate waif is enduring abuse from the one serious malcontent (David Calder), and Ray Davison) wanders off into the sands and finds out some discouraging news, the film?s tragic agenda has warmed up for a series of predictably nasty and miserable epiphanies.

As the remaining castaways, McTeer, Romane Bohringer, Brion James, Chris Walker and Lia Williams circle the movie like hungry predators. But Levring, who has worked for more than a decade as a commercial director, is trying to be the star and sucks up all the available air with his erratic style, leaving the viewer breathless in a bad way.

THE KING IS ALIVE

IFC Films

Newmarket and Good Machine International present a Zentropa Entertainments production

Screenwriters: Kristian Levring, Anders Thomas Jensen

Producers: Patricia Kruijer, Vibeke Windelov

Executive producers: William A. Tyrer, Chris J. Ball, David Linde, Peter Aalbaek Jensen

Director of photography: Jens Schlosser

Editor: Nicholas Wayman Harris

Color/stereo

Cast:

Henry: David Bradley

Jack: Miles Anderson

Gina: Jennifer Jason Leigh

Liz: Janet McTeer

Catherine: Romane Bohringer

Charles: David Calder

Ray: Bruce Davison

Ashley: Brion James

Moses: Vusi Kunene

Kanana: Peter Kubheka

Running time ? 110 minutes

MPAA rating: R...

French director Gilles Mimouni makes an unusually assured feature debut with this stylish suspenser that manages to pay a debt to "Vertigo" while going off in original directions of its own.

Although the convoluted plot ultimately has too many twists, there's much delicious fun to be had along the way. Recently showcased at the Miami Film Festival, the film is a good bet for domestic theatrical distribution, not to mention an American remake.

Anyone who thinks they can stay ahead of this story line had better revise their expectations. Shifting back and forth in time, the film tells the story of successful yuppie Max Vincent Cassell), who, while dining at a restaurant with his business associates and his fiancee, thinks that he sees his ex, Lisa (Monica Bellucci), the love of his life who got away. After an intense phone conversation with an apparent boyfriend, she flees the restaurant, with Max in pursuit, but he loses her. Soon, instead of jetting off to Tokyo for an important meeting, he secretly stays in Paris to find Lisa, all the while aided by Lucien (Jean-Philippe Ecoffey), another friend from the past with whom he's been recently reunited.

Max manages to find Lisa's apartment and breaks in to wait for her. The occupant returns and, to Max's chagrin, it's another woman (Romane Bohringer), who claims to be Mary's best friend. He manages to rescue her just before she takes a suicidal leap from the window. She invites him to stay over, and it isn't long before the two are involved in a torrid clinch. It would spoil the fun of the film to give away anything more; suffice it to say that identities and motivations here are never quite what they seem, and writer-director Mimouni has a seemingly inexhaustible bag of cinematic and storytelling tricks that keeps the audience in a delighted state of breathless anticipation and confusion.

Unlike most first-time helmers, Mimouni seems utterly assured with the film medium, and invests "L'Appartement" with a compelling visual stylishness and imagination. The young cast delivers expert performances, with Cassell highly winning as the befuddled Max and Bohringer alternately sexy, pitiful and menacing as the multifaceted Lisa. Tech credits are first-rate, with the city of Paris captured in all its visual splendor.

L'APPARTEMENT

(THE APARTMENT)

UGC D.A. International

Director-screenwriter Gilles Mimouni

Producer Georges Benayoun

Executive producer Elisabeth Deviosse

Cinematography Thierry Arbogast

Editors Caroline Beggerstaff, Francoise Bonnot

Music Peter Chase

Color/stereo

Cast:

Max Vincent Cassell

Alice Romane Bohringer

Lucien Jean-Philippe Ecoffey

Lisa Monica Bellucci

Running time -- 116 minutes

No MPAA rating...