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"You're a real sicko, aren't you?" Yellow Veil Pics has posted an official trailer for an indie French thriller called The Other Laurens, made by quirky Belgian filmmaker Claude Schmitz. This originally premiered at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival in the Directors' Fortnight sidebar, and it also played at Fantastic Fest in the fall. Gabriel Laurens is a private detective. When his niece, Jade, asks him to investigate her dad's death, Gabriel must confronts the ghosts of his past... He finds himself caught up in a strange investigation mixing pretense, fantasy, and drug trafficking. It's described as a "deadpan detective story" in which he "is mistaken for his shady twin brother in this absurdist comedy." Starring Olivier Rabourdin, Louise Leroy, Kate Moran, Marc Barbé, Tibo Vandenborre, and Edwin Gaffney. The filmmaker explains: "To me, true freedom lies in the fact of freeing oneself from the boundaries that are specific to genres.

Stars: François Civil, Vincent Cassel, Romain Duris, Pio Marmai, Eva Green, Louis Garrel, Vicky Krieps, Jacob Fortune-Lloyd, Lyna Khoudri, Eric Ruf, Marc Barbé | Written by Matthieu Delaporte, Alexandre de La Patellière | Directed by Martin Bourboulon

The eagerly awaited second part of French director Martin Bourboulon’s rollicking Three Musketeers adaptation, following on from Part One (D’Artagnan), released earlier this year. Packed with exciting swashbuckling action and terrific performances, it’s a highly entertaining adventure that brings the story to a thoroughly satisfying conclusion.

The Three Musketeers: Milady picks up immediately where Part One’s nail-biting cliffhanger left off, with King’s Musketeer D’Artagnan (Francois Civil) frantically searching for his kidnapped girlfriend, Queen’s maid Constance Bonacieux (Lyna Khoudri). In the process he uncovers a sinister plot to overthrow King Louis Xiii (Louis Garrel) and discovers that Constance’s life is in danger because she witnessed the secret identity of the mastermind behind the scheme.

Yellow Veil Pictures, the U.S.-based arthouse genre distribution company, has acquired North American rights to Belgian director Claude Schmitz’s deadpan detective thriller “The Other Laurens.”

The feature debut world premiered at Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight and will have its North American Premiere at Fantastic Fest which kicks off Sept. 23 in Austin, Texas. Yellow Veil Pictures plans for a theatrical release in 2024.

“The Other Laurens” follows a private detective, Gabriel, who has been asked by his niece to investigate her father’s death. Gabriel must confront the ghosts of his past and finds himself caught up in a strange investigation mixing fantasy and drug trafficking.

“‘The Other Laurens’ stands beside films like ‘The Big Lebowski’ and ‘The Long Goodbye’ in melding a level of absurdism into Neo-noir, revealing something darker beneath the surface,” said Joe Yannick at Yellow Veil Pictures.

The deal was negotiated by Hugues Barbier, Justin Timms...

Stars: François Civil, Vincent Cassel, Romain Duris, Pio Marmai, Eva Green, Louis Garrel, Vicky Krieps, Jacob Fortune-Lloyd, Lyna Khoudri, Eric Ruf, Marc Barbé | Written by Matthieu Delaporte, Alexandre de La Patellière | Directed by Martin Bourboulon

Directed by Martin Bourboulon, this French adaptation of the classic Alexandre Dumas novel is part one of two, with the second (Milady) due to be released in France in December. Positively bursting with French talent, it’s a swashbuckling treat from start to finish, and the best Dumas adaptation in decades.

Set in 1627, the film begins with young Charles D’Artagnan (François Civil) arriving in Paris from Gascony, his heart set on becoming one of the King’s Musketeers. However, things don’t quite go according to plan, and by noon, he’s accidentally offended three of them – nobleman Athos (Vincent Cassel), fun-loving Porthos (Pio Marmai) and elegant Aramis (Romain Duris) – and been challenged to three separate duels.

Thriller is directed by Claude Schmitz.

Screen can reveal the first trailer for Claude Schmitz’s debut feature The Other Laurens, which plays in Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes.

Set on the French-Spanish border, The Other Laurens follows a private detective forced to face the ghosts of his past when his niece asks him to investigate her father’s death.

The film stars Olivier Rabourdin, Kate Moran, Marc Barbé and newcomer Louise Leroy.

It is produced by Benoit Roland for Belgium’s Wrong Men and Jérémy Forni for France’s Chevaldeuxtrois.

Brussels–based Best Friend Forever (Bff) handles international sales.

The...

Stars: François Civil, Vincent Cassel, Romain Duris, Pio Marmai, Eva Green, Louis Garrel, Vicky Krieps, Jacob Fortune-Lloyd, Lyna Khoudri, Eric Ruf, Marc Barbé | Written by Matthieu Delaporte, Alexandre de La Patellière | Directed by Martin Bourboulon

Directed by Martin Bourboulon, this French adaptation of the classic Alexandre Dumas novel is part one of two, with the second (Milady) due to be released in France in December. Positively bursting with French talent, it’s a swashbuckling treat from start to finish, and the best Dumas adaptation in decades.

Set in 1627, the film begins with young Charles D’Artagnan (François Civil) arriving in Paris from Gascony, his heart set on becoming one of the King’s Musketeers. However, things don’t quite go according to plan, and by noon, he’s accidentally offended three of them – nobleman Athos (Vincent Cassel), fun-loving Porthos (Pio Marmai) and elegant Aramis (Romain Duris) – and been challenged to three separate duels.

The sidebar unveiled its 55th selection under new artistic director Julien Rejl on Tuesday (April 18).

Films from Michel Gondry, Hong Sangsoo and Cédric Kahn are among the 19 features set to world premiere at the 55th Cannes Directors’ Fortnight, running May 17-26.

Scroll down for the full selection

Incoming artistic director Julien Rejl unveiled the line-up at a press conference in Paris on Tuesday (April 18) for the non-competitive Cannes parallel section run by French directors guild the Srf.

Rejl said he and his committee chose the films from nearly 4,000 submissions and travelled to more than 20 countries to meet filmmakers and professionals across the globe.

The sidebar unveiled its 55th selection under new artistic director Julien Rejl on Tuesday (April 18).

Projects from Michel Gondry, Hong Sang-Soo and Cédric Kahn are among the 19 features set to world premiere at the 55th Cannes Directors’ Fortnight, running May 17-26.

Scroll down for the full selection

Incoming artistic director Julien Rejl unveiled the line-up at a press conference in Paris on Tuesday (April 18) for the non-competitive Cannes parallel section run by French directors guild the Srf.

Rejl said he and his committee chose the films from nearly 4,000 submissions and travelled to more than 20 countries to meet filmmakers and professionals across the globe.

The film stars Olivier Rabourdin, Kate Moran, Marc Barbé and newcomer Louise Leroy and is now in post.

Brussels–based Best Friend Forever (Bff) has boarded Belgian thriller The Other Laurens, a first feature from Claude Schmitz with a starry European cast and is kicking off sales at the European Film Market.

Set on the French-Spanish border, The Other Laurens follows a private detective forced to face the ghosts of his past when his niece asks him to investigate her father’s death. The film stars Olivier Rabourdin, Kate Moran, Marc Barbé and newcomer Louise Leroy and is now in post.

Paris Police 1900 blends police procedural and political thriller in La Belle Epoque. But this is no beautiful city. Paris is on the cusp of a new millennium. It is an old city overburdened by its rapidly rising population. Modernity is marching through art and architecture, science and technology, politics and the streets.

The series opens with the fellatio-related death of the French President Félix Faure (Denis Ardant) in February 1899. This event, along with the Dreyfus Affair, helps plunge French politics into turmoil and threatens the continuation of the Third Republic. Meanwhile a young police detective, Antoine Jouin (Jérémie Laheurte), is drawn into the investigation of a woman's murder. Her corpse was found dismembered, stuffed in a suitcase, floating in the Seine. Events transpire to draw the detective, the president's courtesan Marguerite Steinheil (Evelyne Brochu) and the newly appointed police prefect Louis Lépine (Marc Barbé) towards the heart of the...

Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani’s Let the Corpses Tan is a film about sensations, derived more so from the mechanics of filmmaking than from storytelling. Like their previous works, it exists as a standalone genre film in the classic European mold, even when divorced from its stylistic trappings, with sunshine and gunfire supplanting dark corridors and unsheathed daggers. In the last ten years, the reception of Cattet and Forzani has come to understand theirs as a tactile cinema: What happens onscreen is never quite as important as how it looks and sounds—or perhaps, how it ‘feels’—while it’s happening. While Corpses is certainly exploitation cinema formally in its emulation of European westerns and gangster films, it is also exploitation cinema by design in its manipulation and abstraction of photography and sound.As with their two previous features Amer (2009) and The Strange Color of Your Body’s Tears...

"I feel alive again." Cohen Media Group has released an official Us trailer for the film Gauguin: Voyage to Tahiti, originally known as just Gauguin in its released in Europe last year. The film is finally hitting limited Us theaters this summer. Gauguin: Voyage to Tahiti stars Vincent Cassel as famous French artist Paul Gauguin, a painter who decided to leave behind his wife and child and civilized life to travel out to Tahiti in 1891. The film is about his decision to go to Tahiti and his romance and connection with a young Tahitian girl named Tehura, played by Tuheï Adams. The cast includes Malik Zidi, Pua-Taï Hikutini, Pernille Bergendorff, Marc Barbé, Paul Jeanson, Cédric Eeckhout, and Samuel Jouy. This looks quite good, with a compelling performance by Cassel as the inspired painter. I would really like to see this. Here's the official Us trailer (+ poster) for Edouard Deluc's Gauguin: Voyage to Tahiti,...

The newest thriller from directors Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani, Let the Corpses Tan – also known by its French title Laissez bronzer les cadavres – now has its first U.S. trailer just ahead of its late-summer domestic release. After its initial premiere at the Locarno Film Festival, Let the Corpses Tan went on to screen at a handful of prestigious festivals around the world – including Toronto International (where we reviewed), Sitges, London, and the AFI Fest. Having directed Amer and The Strange Color of Your Body’s Tears, Cattet and Forzani have shown their dominance and hyper-stylization within the thriller genre – and now they’re bringing their expertise to the barren countryside in their neo-western Let the Corpses Tan.

The film tells the story of a gang of thieves who, after smuggling 500 pounds of gold, run into trouble when faced against complications from a pair of locals and police officers.

"I couldn't look away!" Kino Lorber has debuted an official Us trailer for the gritty, French "neo-western" thriller titled Let the Corpses Tan, or Laissez bronzer les cadavres. This premiered at the Locarno and Toronto Film Festivals last year, and is the latest feature from directors Hélène Cattet & Bruno Forzani. Here's the plot: A grizzled thug and his gang head to an island retreat with a haul of 250 kilograms of gold bullion to lay low; however, a bohemian writer, his muse, and a pair of gendarmes further complicate things, as allegiances are put to the test. The cast includes Elina Löwensohn, Stéphane Ferrara, Bernie Bonvoisin, Michelangelo Marchese, and Marc Barbé. The trailer does a better job at introducing this stylish film than any text, so dive in and give it a look. Based on a classic pulp novel by Jean-Patrick Manchette, and featuring music by the master Ennio Morricone. Here's...

Review by Matthew Turner

Stars: Elina Lowensohn, Stephane Ferrara, Bernie Bonvoisin, Herve Sogne, Michelangelo Marchese, Marc Barbe, Pierre Nisse, Marine Sainsily, Dorilya Calmel, Aline Stevens, Dominique Troyes, Bamba | Written and Directed by Helene Cattet, Bruno Forzani

Belgian co-directors Helene Cattet and Bruno Forzani garnered an instant cult following with Amer (2009) and The Strange Colour of Your Body’s Tears (2013), both of which paid luxurious homage to 1970s giallo movies. Their latest film, Let the Corpses Tan (or Laissez Bronzer les Cadavres, original language fans) sees the pair applying their expert pastiche skills to violent European crime thrillers of the same decade, to deliriously enjoyable effect.

Loosely adapted from a 1971 French novel by Jean-Patrick Machete and Jean-Pierre Bastid, the plot is deceptively simple and a good deal more coherent than either of Cattet and Forzani’s previous films. Former Hal Hartley muse Elina Lowensohn plays Luce, a middle-aged artist who lives in a run-down,...

In the argument of “style over substance,” movies like Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani’s Let The Corpses Tan make a case for limitless artistic boundaries. In every sense, this is a Giallo-fied Spaghetti Western stand-off that feeds off ambition. Like a six-shooter filled with posh glitter, liquified gold, graphic gore and creative architecture unlike anything mainstream cinema will back. There’s a narrative, but it’s flimsy and underdeveloped with full intent – all focus is on the exploration of cinematic techniques. Cattet and Forzani never care if you even know a character’s name, as they’re only interested in how their craniums will splatter when popped by a steel-manufactured projectile.

Yet, nonetheless, there is indeed a story at play – criminals who hide out with a vacationing family, and the two cops who spark a can-go-wrong, will-go-wrong exchange. Rhino (Stephane Ferrara) fights for his gang’s stolen gold, Luce (Elina Löwensohn) stirs the pot,...

Having plunged as deep as their knives could go into the long-dead corpse of the giallo genre in Amer and The Strange Color of Your Body’s Tears, Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani now forge a kind of hybrid of the spaghetti Westerns and Italian crime films of the late ’60s, stripping out nearly all story and keeping the sublime transfixion on material iconography and brute behaviour. Adapted from Jean-Patrick Manchette’s lean debut novel from 1971 (co-written by Jean-Pierre Bastid, who, like Manchette, was also immersed in genre cinema), Let the Corpses Tan opens with target practice shooting up neo-expressionist paintings, introducing the two groups (artists and gangsters) hiding atop a Corsican redoubt. After a whip-fast gold heist along the coast (executed by Cattet and Forzani with a fiercely staccato musical precision) attracts the local police, the mixed-class gang holes up in the sun-baked ruins to fight first against the law and,...

Respectively coming off red-hot Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight titles in big winner Les Combattants and Alleluia, actresses Adèle Haenel and Lola Dueñas are reteaming (they both appeared in Katell Quillévéré’s Suzanne) on Léa Fehner’s sophomore film which begins lensing next month. According to Cineuropa, Marion Bouvarel, Marc Barbé and the filmmaker’s own father and sister in François and Inès Fehner are also joining the project. Les Ogres digs into the filmmaker’s family background - François Fehner knows a thing or two about pitching up a tent. Bus Films’ Philippe Liégeois is producing.

Gist: Written by Fehner, Catherine Paillé and Brigitte Sy, this revolves around an aging troupe belonging to a traveling theatre company.

Worth Noting: Fehner’s Venice Film Fest selected debut film Silent Voice (see trailer below), won the prestigious Louis Delluc Prize for Best First Film.

Do We Care?: Moving away from prison walls...

Cloclo (English title: My Way)

Directed by Florent-Emilio Siri

Written by Florent-Emilio Siri and Julien Rappeneau

France/Belgium, 2012

Claude François is not an artist whose name resonates very much in North America, yet his impact on the French music scene was second to none during his envious career, which spanned from the early 60s to the late 70s when he met an unpredictable death while attempting to screw a light bulb back in properly while in the shower. Truth be told, his impact on the North American music scene may be greater than most people even realize. The legendary ‘May Way’ song, most famously sung by crooner Frank Sinatra and from which the film derives its international English language title, was originally a French song written by Claude François, ‘Comme d’habitude.’ Florent-Emilio Siri’s film adaptation of the French icon’s life, Cloclo, was released on the silver screen...

The Cabin In The Woods (15)

(Drew Goddard, 2011, Us) Richard Jenkins, Bradley Whitford, Chris Hemsworth, Anna Hutchison, Fran Kranz. 95 mins

It's clear from the outset this Jj Abrams-produced genre offering isn't your standard slasher movie, as a traditional teen country break set-up is monitored by wisecracking officials in some mysterious bunker. But exactly what the twist is, it's better to discover for yourself. Let's just say it gives the horror formula an exhilarating jolt without destroying it, in a Lost-meets-Scooby-Doo sort of way – a meta-mystery tour signposted with spoiler alerts.

Battleship (12A)

(Peter Berg, 2012, Us) Taylor Kitsch, Liam Neeson, Alexander Skarsgård, Rihanna. 131 mins

After the triumph of Transformers, Hasbro spin off another of their products, resulting in an effects-driven alien invasion that looks a lot like, er, Transformers. Expect Michael Bay-scale destruction, lots of CG explosions and military heroism, with extra cheese.

A Night To Remember (PG)

(Roy Ward Baker,...

This revisionist account of Mozart's early life reclaims one of history's lost women. If only the film weren't so turgid

René Féret's earnest and ponderously acted movie is partly a feminist reclaiming of one of history's lost women, and also a revisionist, speculative account of Mozart's early life that is not so far away from Milos Forman's Amadeus. It has a seriousness that commands attention, and a very believable sense of the hardship and bitterness Mozart Sr put his family through. It is a good subject. If only this film weren't so turgid, and didn't have that strained quality in the sound recording that picks up every extraneous costume-rustle and makes the background silence in every scene seem like a continuous hiss.

Marc Barbé and Delphine Chuillot are Léopold and Anna-Maria Mozart, parents who are putting their children through a gruelling and continuous continental tour. Their remarkable 10-year-old,...

Chantal Akerman (center), Almayer's Folly World Cinema Selections Almayer's Folly: Chantal Akerman loosely adapts Joseph Conrad’s novel set in Malaysia, the tragic tale of a failed European trader and his "mixed blood" daughter. Dir Chantal Akerman. Cast Stanislas Merhar, Marc Barbé, Aurora Marion, Zac Andrianasolo. Belgium/France. U.S. Premiere. Alps: Dogtooth director Yorgos Lanthimos returns with a tale of a group offering an unusual service for grieving families: They inhabit the role of the recently deceased. Dir Yorgos Lanthimos. Scr Yorgos Lanthimos, Efthimis Filippou. Cast Aggeliki Papoulia, Aris Servetalis, Ariane Labed, Johnny Vekris. Greece/France. U.S. Premiere. CARRÉ Blanc: One of the strongest debuts in years, CARRÉ Blanc is a dystopian sci-fi vision of a world with limited resources and limitless cruelty. Dir/Scr Jean-Baptiste Léonetti. Cast Sami Bouajila, Julie Gayet, Jean-Pierre Andreani, Fejria Deliba, Valerie Bodson. France/Luxembourg/Russia/Belgium/Switzerland. The Day He Arrives:...

Single tickets for films showing at Tiff officially go on sale tomorrow and before you consider paying for an overpriced, over-hyped, red carpet Gala screening of a film that will be out in theatres week later, we suggest you mix it up a bit and consider the alternative. Joined by our own Toronto based critic Blake Williams (who is also presenting his latest short entitled Coorow-Latham Road in Wavelengths 4 this year), we've complied a 25-list of invigorating films from pioneering master filmmakers who still don't get enough cred to visionaries making their first contributions to cinema. We begin the countdown with..:  #1. Almayers Folly Director: Chantal Akerman Cast: Stanislas Merhar, Marc Barbé, Aurora Marion, Zac Andrianasolo Distributor: Rights Available Buzz: Akerman is at once a key figure in structural filmmaking, 60's & 70's world cinema, and women's filmmaking in general. Producing some of the most contemplative and soaring masterpieces of the last few decades (Jeanne Dielman,...

Directed by René Feret

Starring Marie Féret, Marc Barbé, Delphine Chuillot, David Moreau, Clovis Fouin, Lisa Féret

Trapped forever in the shadow of her genius younger brother, Maria Anna Mozart (nicknamed Nannerl) has inspired much speculation over the centuries.

Was her musical talent equivalent to Wolfgang’s? Did she compose her own music only for her father to deny its existence? What made her give up performing? After touring Europe’s palaces with her family as a child, why did she hide away in Salzburg from her mid-teens onwards? She cuts an intriguing figure in Baroque history. She is typical of all the talented female writers, composers and artists who never had a chance to shine because of their gender, yet she is unique in that she did have her opportunity on the public stage, and, given Mozart’s support of her ability, could have had her day in the sun.