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Who decides what’s best for a child? In “Adam’s Sake,” a scrawny 4-year-old boy is admitted to the pediatric ward with a broken arm, which the doctors attribute to malnutrition. A social worker is called, and Adam’s mother — who’s hardly more than a child herself — is forbidden access to her son while hospital staff try to nurse him back to health. But Adam refuses to eat unless his mother is present, fighting against the feeding tubes the doctors have ordered.

All that is backstory that we piece together on the trot during the opening minutes of Belgian director Laura Wandel’s emotionally wrenching whirlwind, which is bolstered by a pair of terrific performances from Léa Drucker as Lucy, the pediatric department’s head nurse, and “Happening” star Anamaria Vartolomei as Adam’s mom, Rebecca — to say nothing of soulful newcomer Jules Delsart, the remarkable young actor who plays Adam.

Claire Denis is known for her portrayal of sensuous themes in her films. The images in a Claire Denis film are filled with human bodies and tight close-ups, and the camera is positioned in such a manner that it seems to caress them softly. Additionally, Denis’ use of music enhances the visuals with an added depth of poetry. Yet, beneath this apparent tenderness lies a brutality. The interesting part is that it doesn’t serve the purpose of shock value but rather emerges as an interior desire inherent to the human condition.

Her 2001 film “Trouble Every Day” is a prime example of this seamless blending of tenderness and brutality. It consists of two separate arcs that converge midway through the film. In one arc, the story follows a newlywed American couple on their honeymoon in Paris. Despite being on his honeymoon, the husband, Shane Brown (Vincent Gallo), a scientist by profession,...

It’s a great time to be a Claire Denis fan. After delivering two (severely underrated) movies in one year with Both Sides of the Blade and Stars at Noon, she’s prepping a pair of new projects. In between, the stunning new restoration has arrived for No Fear, No Die, her 1992 feature pitting Alex Descas and Isaach de Bankolé in the world of cockfighting. In celebration of the new restoration, she’s now revealed what it might take to convince her to join the superhero fold and reteam with her High Life star Robert Pattinson to direct a Batman movie.

Not even pressed with a superhero-related question unlike the plethora of outlets that seem required to ask every auteur, Denis revealed to Screen Slate, “I watched The Batman [2022] because Robert Pattinson is a friend. Of course, it’s a lot, a lot, a lot of post-production. A crew of 300. But the work inside,...

Understanding and appreciation of Claire Denis has long faced the vacancy of No Fear, No Die, her 1992 feature pitting Alex Descas and Isaach de Bankolé in the world of cockfighting. Whether you’ve watched the fuzzy DVD rip that’s satiated fans or have awaited better opportunities, a 4K restoration from The Film Desk and Pathé arrives as manna from heaven––watching it recently was like having a new Denis film altogether. With No Fear, No Die now playing at Bam, the Siskel Film Center, and Austin Film Society, there’s a fresh, Abdullah Ibrahim-scored trailer that we’re pleased to debut.

Here’s the synopsis: “Isaach de Bankolé and Alex Descas star in the under-seen second feature by celebrated director Claire Denis, an unflinching portrait of two Black immigrant men from Benin and French Antilles, scraping out a living through illegal cockfights in a restaurant basement on the outskirts of Paris.

S'en fout la mort.A sliver of an angular face appears in the dark front seat of a car. A hand leaves the steering wheel with a cigarette, emanating tendrils of smoke in its wake. A whispered voiceover: “I’m Black, and my friend is the same color. He’s from the West Indies and I’m from Benin. Waiting here, a single phrase keeps coming back to me: Human beings, all human beings, of whatever race or nationality or religious belief or ideology—will do anything and everything. I can’t remember who said it, but it doesn’t matter. My name is Dah.” Answering his dismissed question, the preceding title card had already attributed the quote to Chester Himes. Cited twice and half remembered, this epigraph introduces the claustrophobic nightscape of doublings and returns that is S’en fout la mort (1990)—retitled in English as No Fear, No...

In a 1990 issue of Essence, Isaach De Bankolé was heralded as “France’s new leading man,” largely due to his appearance in Jacques W. Benoit’s How to Make Love to a Negro Without Getting Tired, a French-language Canadian comedy released in 1989 about, per the magazine, “a struggling novelist who is irresistibly appealing to white women.” Even if intended as satire, that film’s provocative title provides a stark counterpoint to the far weightier and serious concerns of Claire Denis’s No Fear, No Die, in which De Bankolé plays Dah, a French immigrant from Benin toiling on the outskirts of Paris trying to make ends meet.

In Denis’s poetic and clear-eyed sophomore feature, De Bankolé inhabits a character whose default expression speaks to his disaffection, caught as he is in a web of exploitation that thrusts him into the world of illegal cockfights held in the basement of a small restaurant.

Throughout history, horror films have always been social activities -- manageable mini-adventures to be experienced in kinship with a friend, a group, a date, a significant other. There's something perennially appealing about sharing a scary and disturbing movie with someone you love, seeing them react alongside you, feeling bound by a collective sense of dread, encouraging each other to shrug off the fight-or-flight instinct, and ride it out when a scene gets too horrifying. A good horror film can even bring people closer. But horror films are seldomly family events.

To be sure, there is a certain logic to watching specific horror movies with family members. The urgency of a survival adventure like "Train to Busan" or "A Quiet Place," the simmering intensity of a creature thriller like "Jaws" or "Alien," the roller-coaster-ride excitement of a game transformed into an exercise in terror in "The Conjuring," or the unspooling mysteries...

You can always count on horror to test boundaries, so it’s no surprise that the genre has long explored the taboo of cannibalism. Cannibals are most often associated with exploitation horror, leading to a cannibal horror boon in the ’70s and early ’80s, thanks to Italian horror filmmakers like Umberto Lenzi, Ruggero Deodato, and Joe D’Amato. But as the Video Nasty craze came and went and time evolved the genre, so did the depiction of cannibalism.

The ’90s brought horror’s most common depiction of cannibals out of the jungle and into society, largely thanks to The Silence of the Lambs’ Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins). The Academy Award-winning feature adapted Thomas Harris’ 1988 novel and introduced a supporting character so fascinating that he overshadowed the film’s actual antagonist, Buffalo Bill (Ted Levine). Protagonist Clarice Starling gets assigned to interview the incarcerated cannibalistic serial killer in the hopes that Dr.

Pathé’s 4K restoration of No Fear No Die is a highlight of the Revivals program Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

Film at Lincoln Center has announced the Revivals selections of the 60th New York Film Festival. Highlights include Pedro Costa’s O Sangue (Blood); Jean Eustache’s The Mother and the Whore, starring Jean-Pierre Léaud, Bernadette Lafont, and Françoise Lebrun; Jacques Tourneur’s Canyon Passage starring Brian Donlevy (with Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg consulting on this restoration); Claire Denis’s No Fear No Die with Isaach De Bankole, Alex Descas, and Jean-Claude Brialy; Mikko Niskanen’s Eight Deadly Shots; Manoel de Oliveira’s The Day Of Despair on the life of Camilo Castelo Branco, played by Mario Barroso; Edward Yang’s A Confucian Confusion starring Ni Shujun, and Balufu Bakupu-Kanyinda’s Le Damier, screening with Radu Jude’s short The Potemkinists (in the Currents program).

The 60th New York Film...

"Tomb Raider" actress Alicia Vikander stars in the new limited drama action miniseries "Irma Vep", written and directed by Olivier Assayas, now streaming on HBO Max:

"...'Irma Vep' follows a movie star named 'Mira' as she struggles with the distinctions between herself and the characters she plays. Mira is disillusioned by her career and a recent breakup, so she moves to France to star as 'Irma Vep' in a remake of the French silent film classic, 'Les Vampires'..."

Cast also includes Vincent Macaigne as 'René Vidal', Jeanne Balibar as 'Zoe', Devon Ross as 'Regina', Lars Eidinger as 'Gottfried', Vincent Lacoste as 'Edmond Lagrange', Nora Hamzawi as 'Carla', Adria Arjona as 'Laurie', Carrie Brownstein as 'Zelda', Tom Sturridge as 'Eamonn', Byron Bowers as 'Herman', Fala Chen as 'Cynthia Keng', Hippolyte Girardot as 'Robert Danjou', Alex Descas as 'Gregory Desormeaux' and Antoine Reinartz as 'Jeremie'.

"Tomb Raider" actress Alicia Vikander stars in the new limited drama action miniseries "Irma Vep", written and directed by Olivier Assayas, now streaming on HBO Max:

"...'Irma Vep' follows a movie star named 'Mira' as she struggles with the distinctions between herself and the characters she plays. Mira is disillusioned by her career and a recent breakup, so she moves to France to star as 'Irma Vep' in a remake of the French silent film classic, 'Les Vampires'..."

Cast also includes Vincent Macaigne as 'René Vidal', Jeanne Balibar as 'Zoe', Devon Ross as 'Regina', Lars Eidinger as 'Gottfried', Vincent Lacoste as 'Edmond Lagrange', Nora Hamzawi as 'Carla', Adria Arjona as 'Laurie', Carrie Brownstein as 'Zelda', Tom Sturridge as 'Eamonn', Byron Bowers as 'Herman', Fala Chen as 'Cynthia Keng', Hippolyte Girardot as 'Robert Danjou', Alex Descas as 'Gregory Desormeaux' and Antoine Reinartz as 'Jeremie'.

"Tomb Raider" actress Alicia Vikander stars in the new limited drama action miniseries "Irma Vep", written and directed by Olivier Assayas, streaming June 6, 2022 on HBO Max:

"...'Irma Vep' follows a movie star named 'Mira' as she struggles with the distinctions between herself and the characters she plays. Mira is disillusioned by her career and a recent breakup, so she moves to France to star as 'Irma Vep' in a remake of the French silent film classic, 'Les Vampires'..." 

Cast also includes Vincent Macaigne as 'René Vidal', Jeanne Balibar as 'Zoe', Devon Ross as 'Regina', Lars Eidinger as 'Gottfried', Vincent Lacoste as 'Edmond Lagrange', Nora Hamzawi as 'Carla', Adria Arjona as 'Laurie', Carrie Brownstein as 'Zelda', Tom Sturridge as 'Eamonn', Byron Bowers as 'Herman', Fala Chen as 'Cynthia Keng', Hippolyte Girardot as 'Robert Danjou', Alex Descas as 'Gregory Desormeaux' and Antoine Reinartz as 'Jeremie'.

“Surface,” the new eight-episode psychological thriller series starring “The Morning Show” alum Gugu Mbatha-Raw, will premiere globally with the first three episodes on Friday, July 29 on Apple TV+. New episodes will air weekly every Friday after the premiere.

The series follows Mbatha-Raw’s character of Sophie after a traumatic head injury has left her with extreme memory loss. Set in San Francisco, Sophie embarks on a quest to put the pieces of her life back together with the help of her husband and friends. Things turn sour, though, as she begins to question whether or not the truth she is told is really the truth she has lived. Through twists and turns and an unexpected love triangle, “Surface” is a story of self-discovery and a philosophical exploration of free will.

Rounding out the cast of the series is Oliver Jackson-Cohen (“The Haunting of Hill House”), Stephan James (“If Beale Street Could Talk...

It’s intriguing for a long-term fan of a director, perhaps even one whose films you’ve grown up alongside the last decade or two, to watch them stumble slightly. But for Claire Denis, the remarkable auteur in question, even her strongest works can have a teetering, tentative quality, as if you were discovering the dawning narrative and emotional progression in tandem with her.

Stars at Noon––based on a minor novel by the underrated American author Denis Johnson––is Denis’ second film to premiere this year, after Both Sides of the Blade at the Berlinale, and a slightly rocky reaction to that film diminished some of the anticipation for this one. Her latest work is not one that feels fully achieved and realized, suggesting an absolutely confident mastery of her primary source material, but it’s still deeply watchable, laden with sex and intimacy in a way that doesn’t apologize for itself,...

"Tomb Raider" actress Alicia Vikander stars in the new limited drama action miniseries "Irma Vep", written and directed by Olivier Assayas, remaking his 1996 feature, streaming June 6, 2022 on HBO Max:

"...'Irma Vep' follows a movie star named 'Mira' as she struggles with the distinctions between herself and the characters she plays. Mira is disillusioned by her career and a recent breakup, so she moves to France to star as 'Irma Vep' in a remake of the French silent film classic, 'Les Vampires'..." 

Cast also includes Vincent Macaigne as 'René Vidal', Jeanne Balibar as 'Zoe', Devon Ross as 'Regina', Lars Eidinger as 'Gottfried', Vincent Lacoste as 'Edmond Lagrange', Nora Hamzawi as 'Carla', Adria Arjona as 'Laurie', Carrie Brownstein as 'Zelda', Tom Sturridge as 'Eamonn', Byron Bowers as 'Herman', Fala Chen as 'Cynthia Keng', Hippolyte Girardot as 'Robert Danjou', Alex Descas as 'Gregory Desormeaux' and Antoine Reinartz as 'Jeremie'.

HBO released the trailer for its upcoming limited series “Irma Vep,” from writer-director Olivier Assayas, based on his 1996 film of the same name. Starring Academy Award winner Alicia Vikander (“Ex Machina”) and produced in partnership with A24, the series premieres June 6 on HBO and HBO Max.

Vikander plays Mira, an American film star fresh out of a relationship and disillusioned by her career. She comes to France to play the role of Irma Vep — an anagram for “vampire” — in a remake of the French silent film “Les Vampires.” As she takes on the role, the line between fiction and reality begins to blur, and Mira struggles to grasp the world around her.

Assayas’ original film starred Maggie Cheung as herself and functioned as commentary on the state of French cinema at the time. Like the limited series, the film debuted at the 1996 Cannes Film Festival. HBO’s “Irma Vep” will...

Irma Vep has a premiere date on HBO. The series, which stars Oscar winner Alicia Vikander, will arrive in June. Vincent Macaigne, Jeanne Balibar, Devon Ross, Lars Eidinger, Vincent Lacoste, Nora Hamzawi, Adria Arjona, Carrie Brownstein, Tom Sturridge, Byron Bowers, Fala Chen, Hippolyte Girardot, Alex Descas, and Antoine Reinartz also star. The series is written and directed by French filmmaker Olivier Assayas, the writer/director of the original 1996 film.

Read More…...

"Tomb Raider" actress Alicia Vikander stars in the new limited drama miniseries "Irma Vep", written and directed by Olivier Assayas, remaking his 1996 feature, streaming June 6, 2022 on HBO Max:

"...'Irma Vep' follows a movie star named 'Mira' as she struggles with the distinctions between herself and the characters she plays. Mira is disillusioned by her career and a recent breakup, so she moves to France to star as 'Irma Vep' in a remake of the French silent film classic, 'Les Vampires'..." 

Cast also includes Vincent Macaigne as 'René Vidal', Jeanne Balibar as 'Zoe', Devon Ross as 'Regina', Lars Eidinger as 'Gottfried', Vincent Lacoste as 'Edmond Lagrange', Nora Hamzawi as 'Carla', Adria Arjona as 'Laurie', Carrie Brownstein as 'Zelda', Tom Sturridge as 'Eamonn', Byron Bowers as 'Herman', Fala Chen as 'Cynthia Keng', Hippolyte Girardot as 'Robert Danjou', Alex Descas as 'Gregory Desormeaux' and Antoine Reinartz as 'Jeremie'.

Alicia Vikander makes her return to the small screen in HBO’s “Irma Vep,” based on Olivier Assayas’ own 1996 feature film.

Oscar winner Vikander stars as Mira, an American movie star who is disillusioned by Hollywood and a recent breakup. Mira jets to France to star as Irma Vep in a remake of the French silent film, “Les Vampires,” but life soon imitates art as Mira struggles to see where Irma ends and her reality begins.

See Vikander transform into Mira (and Irma) in the first look photos below.

Writer-director Assayas returns for the limited series, which will make its debut at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival before premiering on HBO on Monday, June 6 at 9 p.m. “Irma Vep” will also be available to stream on HBO Max.

Produced in partnership with A24, the series additionally stars Vincent Macaigne, Jeanne Balibar, Devon Ross, Lars Eidinger, Vincent Lacoste, Nora Hamzawi, Adria Arjona,...

HBO has set a June premiere date for Irma Vep, its limited series based on Olivier Assayas’ 1996 feature film, starring Alicia Vikander. Irma Vep, which will world premiere as an Official Selection at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival, will debut on Monday, June 6 at 9 Pm on HBO and will be available to stream on HBO Max. We’re also getting a look at Vikander as Mira in three first-look photos (see above and below).

Written and directed by Assayas (Carlos), Irma Vepp centers on Mira (Vikander) an American movie star disillusioned by her career and a recent breakup, who comes to France to star as Irma Vep in a remake of the French silent film classic, Les Vampires. Set against the backdrop of a lurid crime thriller, Mira struggles as the distinctions between herself and the character she plays begin to blur and merge. Irma Vep reveals to us the uncertain...

Right on the heels of the news that Elon Musk is nearing a deal to buy Twitter, a television documentary about the polarizing businessman has been announced to premiere this May.

Titled “Elon Musk’s Crash Course,” the upcoming film is the latest in FX and The New York Times’ collaborative documentary series “The New York Times Presents,” which provides in depth looks at prominent people and events, ranging from Janet Jackson to Juul to the 2020 Australian bushfire disasters. The series is best known for its two in-depth films about Britney Spears, “Framing Britney Spears” and “Controlling Britney Spears,” which helped contribute to the eventual end of the singer’s conservatorship.

Directed by Emma Schwartz, “Elon Musk’s Crash Course” is an exposé into Musk’s company Tesla, and its work on self-driving cars. Featuring the reporting from Cade Metz and Neal Boudette of The New York Times, the film...

HBO is gearing up to welcome viewers to the world of Irma Vep.

Written and directed by Emmy(R) nominee Olivier Assayas (Carlos), starring Academy Award(R) winner Alicia Vikander (The Danish Girl) and produced in partnership with A24, Irma Vep will debut Monday, June 6 (9:00 - 10:00 p.m. Et/Pt) on HBO and will be available to stream on HBO Max.

As for what the series will be about, here's the logline.

Mira (Alicia Vikander) is an American movie star disillusioned by her career and a recent breakup, who comes to France to star as "Irma Vep" in a remake of the French silent film classic, "Les Vampires."

Set against the backdrop of a lurid crime thriller, Mira struggles as the distinctions between herself and the character she plays begin to blur and merge. Irma Vep reveals to us the uncertain ground that lies at the border of fiction and reality,...

HBO has filled out the French side of the cast for its upcoming limited series Irma Vep, from director Olivier Assayas. Joining series lead Alicia Vikander (Tomb Raider) are French actors Vincent Macaigne, Jeanne Balibar, Lars Eidinger, Vincent Lacoste, Hippolyte Girardot, Alex Descas, Nora Hamzawi, and Antoine Reinartz Irma Vep is loosely based on Assayas’ 1996 film of the same name and follows Vikander’s Mira, an American movie star who travels to France to star in a remake of the silent film “Les Vampires.” With tensions rising on set, Mira struggles to distinguish between herself and the character she plays in the film, turning the story into a comedic crime thriller. Macaigne is set to play French filmmaker René Vidal, while the other new additions will portray various crew members and actors in Vidal’s movie. Previously announced cast members include Adria Arjona (Sweet Girl), Carrie Brownstein (Portlandia), Jerrod Carmichael...

HBO’s “Irma Vep” has added eight new cast members to play featured roles alongside series star Alicia Vikander.

Vincent Macaigne, Jeanne Balibar, Lars Eidinger, Vincent Lacoste, Hippolyte Girardot, Alex Descas, Nora Hamzawi and Antoine Reinartz have joined the series.

“Irma Vep” stars Vikander as Mira, an American movie star who travels to France to star in French filmmaker René Vidal’s remake of “Les Vampires.” As tensions mount around the production, Mira begins to have difficulty distinguishing between her own identity and the character she plays in the film.

Macaigne will play Vidal, while the other newly announced cast members will play various crew members and actors on Vidal’s remake of Louis Feuillade’s “Les Vampires.”

The group joins a list of previously announced cast members that includes Vikander, Adria Arjona, Carrie Brownstein, Jerrod Carmichael, Fala Chen and Devon Ross.

The limited series is a reimagining of sorts for director Olivier Assayas.

French director discussed her childhood in 1950s West Africa.

Filmmaker Claire Denis has revealed that she would love to make a French version of UK director Steve McQueen’s Small Axe TV film series, capturing the lives of the Caribbean community in Paris.

“I would love to do a sort of French Small Axe,” she told the inaugural masterclass of the Doha Film Institute’s 2021 Qumra talent and project incubator event on Friday March 12.

While McQueen’s anthology spans five separate films capturing the lives of West Indian immigrants in London from the 1960s to the 1980s, Denis said her...

There have been several films chronicling on African migration — specifically, undertaking the treacherous journey over the Atlantic in search of better lives — and they’re almost always male-centric and grounded in stark realism. Mati Diop’s “Atlantics” upends that tradition. The Cannes-winning feature debut harnesses fantasy to tell a haunting story about the women who are often left behind. And although Diop hasn’t directly lost loved ones at sea, the story is also a symbolic representation of her own journey as she comes to terms with her identity.

The film, which was selected as Senegal’s entry for Best International Film Oscar consideration, made history when “Atlantics” premiered at Cannes this year and won the Grand Prix. Diop became the first black woman to direct a film featured in the festival’s Competition section; Netflix acquired the title before the end of the festival, solidifying Diop’s breakthrough status.

Antonin Baudry on submarine films, Claude Lanzmann and Wolfgang Petersen's Das Boot: "That was his favourite. It's my favourite too. For some reason it really moved him." Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

The morning after the Us première of The Wolf's Call (Le Chant Du Loup), shot by Pierre Cottereau, starring François Civil with Omar Sy, Mathieu Kassovitz, Reda Kateb, Jean-Yves Berteloot, Damien Bonnard, and Paula Beer at the French Institute Alliance Française in New York, the director/screenwriter Antonin Baudry, aka Abel Lanzac, joined me for a conversation inside David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center.

Kent Jones with Antonin Baudry following the French Institute Alliance Française première of The Wolf's Call (Le Chant Du Loup) in New York Photo: Ed Bahlman

When I mentioned to Antonin that I will be introducing Hélène Fillières' Volontaire this Tuesday at Fi:af, he told me that they were actually shooting their French Navy...

Mati Diop, niece of the late, great Senegalese cinema pioneer Djibril Diop Mambéty — director of African cinema classics “Touki Bouki” and “Hyènes” — makes her feature film directorial debut with “Atlantiques,” which will world premiere at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival. She is the first black woman with a film in the 72-year-old festival’s Competition section, and stands to be one of the biggest breakouts at Cannes this year.

Previously titled “Fire Next Time” (although not based on James Baldwin’s famous essay collection of the same name), the film is in rare company. Currently, Diop and Malian filmmaker Ladj Ly are the only filmmakers of African descent represented in competition at Cannes this year.

Diop is the daughter of Senegalese jazz musician Wasis Diop, but cinephiles will likely be more familiar with her filmmaker uncle. She first received attention from international critics and cinema enthusiasts for her work as an...

Mia Hansen-Løve on Maya and Bergman Island: "You could eventually say that hauntedness is the one thing maybe the two films have in common." Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

In Margarethe von Trotta's Searching For Ingmar Bergman, Mia Hansen-Løve speaks about how Ingmar Bergman's house on Fårö is haunted. Mia's Maya tells the story of journalist Gabriel (Roman Kolinka) who was a hostage in Syria, together with his associate Frédéric (Alex Descas). Returning to France, he cannot cope. Gabriel tells the psychologist (François Loriquet): "The worst was feeling guilty." But he doesn't want therapy because he himself "works with words." It is "the kidnappers who need analysis." His former girlfriend Naomi (Judith Chemla) serenades him with Schubert "Liebchen, komm zu mir!" but not even the moonlight can make him reconnect.

Gabriel (Roman Kolinka) with Maya (Aarshi Banerjee)

Gabriel wants to go to India, to the overgrown house in Goa where he spent his childhood.

Hélène Fillières on Nick Cave's Into My Arms in Raising Colors (Volontaire): "It's probably the most romantic song I've ever heard." Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze Laure (Diane Rouxel) with Commander Rivière (Lambert Wilson)

The last time I saw Lambert Wilson in person, he was performing his tribute to Yves Montand at the French Institute Alliance Française in New York. He was Jacques Cousteau in Jérôme Salle's The Odyssey (L'Odyssée) and now in Hélène Fillières' Raising Colors (Volontaire), co-written with Mathias Gavarry, he is Commander Rivière at the École Navale. The Commander is lovingly called 'the monk' by the chief training officer Albertini, played by Alex Descas. Laure (Diane Rouxel) in her twenties and with a first-rate education, decides to accept a job offer in the administration of the French Navy. Her mother (Josiane Balasko), a famous stage actress, is particularly upset and vocal about this turn of events.

Mia Hansen-Løve’s best films envelop the viewer so persuasively in their currents of feeling that it can take you a moment or two to notice how coolly and methodically constructed they are: the revealing agility of her camera placement, the sharp economy of her editing, the often rich irony of her musical selections, all subtly contributing to character portraits of granular depth. In “Maya,” her sixth and most internationally-minded feature, those virtues hit you straight away, only to reveal more grace and precision in the framing than in the rather hazily conceived characters themselves. A study of a European man’s healing Indian odyssey that gives in all too frequently to hoary colonial romanticism, this is the first stumble in Hansen-Løve’s hitherto impressive filmography — the kind of directorial misstep that at least makes it clear how deft her footwork usually is.

Coming off Hansen-Løve’s best and most...

Following up Goodbye First Love, Things to Come, Eden, and more of the best films of the century thus far, Mia Hansen-Løve returned this year. Premiering on the fall festival circuit was her latest film, Maya, and while it’s still awaiting U.S. distribution, those in France are lucky enough to see it upon its release in December. Ahead of the theatrical release, the first trailer has arrived for the film that follows a French war reporter who was taken to hostage in Syria and then heads to India after months in captivity.

Josh Lewis said in his Tiff review, “Compounded by lush photography and carefully calibrated performances, Maya intimately renders the crushing and rehabilitative power of memory, taking hazy, elusive feelings and bringing them into the realm of the tangible.” See the trailer below for the film starring Roman Kolinka, Aarshi Banerjee, Alex Descas, Pathy Aiyar, Suzan Anbeh,...

Mia Hansen-Løve has carved a unique career for herself as a filmmaker of tacit sensitivity and stories on the margins of more familiar ones. Eden traversed the well-worn story of a rise-and-fall musician by having him never truly rise in the first place; instead exploring the tragedy of a young DJ talented enough to make it a career but not enough to become as big a success as he needs to before his trend of music is over. Hansen-Løve’s ephemeral sense of structure makes it feel like a decade floats by while he’s stuck in a slow-motion spiral of pain and sacrifices so that his life can remain static. Things to Come pulled a similar trick taking the existential mid-life crisis that is forced upon its central character—due to an unexpected divorce, and her obsolescence at home and work—and mining it for the subtle freedoms and...

The Notebook is covering Tiff with an on-going correspondence between critics Kelley Dong and Daniel Kasman.aKashaDear Kelley,The festival definitely is changing now: the industry-oriented market side of the event has finished, so many sales agents and distributors and other such folk have decamped, even as premieres keep being revealed, and audiences are delighted (or exasperated). There's still plenty on my schedule and plenty more I want to share with you.Are there filmmakers for you, Kelley, whose sensibility you embrace but whose films you sometimes struggle to like? That, for me, is Mia Hansen-Løve, who has made six features to date, two of which I think knock it out of the park—The Father of My Children and Things to Come. But her other recent work, including Goodbye, First Love, Eden, and now Maya, may resonate with a sensibility of intelligent compassion and emotional insight, yet tell stories I find torpid.

The people in Mia Hansen-Løve’s movies always struggle with change — specifically, with those bittersweet moments between major life events, which percolate with the sadness of uncertainty and the romance of something new. In “Father of My Children,” a family is dissolved by a sudden death that forces them to reconstitute who they are. In “Eden,” an aspiring French DJ fritters away the best 20 years of his life before coming to grips with the fact that he’ll never be Daft Punk. And in the extraordinary “Things to Come,” a middle-aged professor is burdened with the full weight of a newfound freedom after her husband leaves her for a younger woman.

Change, it seems, is the only constant in Hansen-Løve’s remarkable and constantly surprising body of work, which has already confirmed the 37-year-old filmmaker as one of modern cinema’s most brilliant new voices. But change, in her movies,...

"If I were you, I wouldn't torture myself." Sundance Selects + IFC Films have released an official Us trailer for the latest film from French filmmaker extraordinaire Claire Denis, titled Let the Sunshine In, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival last year. Also titled Un beau soleil intérieur in French, the film stars Juliette Binoche as a middle aged, confident French woman dealing with a variety of unsuitable suitors in this romantic comedy. She meets a number of different men, each who have their own perks and quirks, and downsides as she figures out what romance means to her at this point in her life. The cast includes Xavier Beauvois, Philippe Katerine, Josiane Balasko, Sandrine Dumas, Nicolas Duvauchelle, and Alex Descas. This is a fun film with some fine French humor, but definitely not one of Claire Denis' best. Enjoy. Here's the official Us trailer (+ French poster) for Claire Denis' Let the Sunshine In,...

Whether you translate its title as “Let the Sunshine In” or “Bright Sunshine In,” the new Claire Denis movie remains an exciting prospect for the simple fact that, well, it’s the new Claire Denis movie. Juliette Binoche stars in the romantic comedy, marking the first collaboration between the two icons of French cinema; their work first saw the light of day at Cannes, where it opened the Directors’ Fortnight program. Watch the trailer below.

Here’s the synopsis: “Isabelle (Binoche) is a divorced Parisian painter searching for another shot at love, but refusing to settle for the parade of all-too-flawed men who drift in and out of her life. There’s a caddish banker (Xavier Beauvois) who, like many of her lovers, happens to be married; a handsome actor (Nicolas Duvauchelle) who’s working through his own hang-ups; and a sensitive fellow artist (Alex Descas) who’s skittish about commitment.

There has, of course, been significant investment in High Life, the Claire Denis-Robert Pattinson sci-fi movie that’s expected to finally make landfall this year. (We named it our most-anticipated of 2018, for God’s sake.) Thrilled though I am to see one of our very greatest filmmakers get her biggest-ever spotlight, I hope it doesn’t have some effect of obscuring another forthcoming picture — and one whose quality I can actually attest for, if that helps. (Please.)

Following its run at Cannes and Nyff, Denis’ Juliette Binoche-starrer, Let the Sunshine In, will come to theaters and VOD on April 27. Thus brings a domestic trailer that, like most, I’d recommend skipping — here in particular because this is a picture whose pleasures and oddities unfold delicately, which would account for my allergic reaction to this preview’s emotional strong-arming that ignores proper representation to pull in a bigger crowd.

Close-Up is a feature that spotlights films now playing on Mubi. Fatal Assistance (2013) is showing November 28 - December 28 and Murder in Pacot (2014) is showing November 29 - December 29, 2017 in the United Kingdom as part of the series Build It Better: Two Films By Raoul Peck.For all the glowing rhetoric about democratization, self-help, social capital, and strengthening of civil society, the actual power relations in this new Ngo universe resemble nothing so much as traditional clientelism. Moreover, like the community organizations patronized by the War on Poverty in the 1960s, Third World NGOs have proven brilliant at coopting local leadership as well as hegemonizing the social space traditionally occupied by the Left.—Mike Davis, Planet of Slums “J’aide.” —Alex, Murder in PacotThere’s a dead boy under the rubble and a wretched smell in the air. In Raoul Peck’s 2014 feature Murder in Pacot, a married middle-class couple (‘l’homme,...

Juliet Binoche in Let the Sunshine InClaire Denis's Let the Sunshine In charts the delightfully erratic dalliances and social sparring of a romantically wayward painter, Isabelle (Juliette Binoche), with the many men she encounters in her life (played by, among others, Xavier Beauvois, Alex Descas, and Gérard Depardieu). The film will receive its North American premiere at the New York Film Festival. After premiering in the Directors' Fortnight section of the 70th Cannes Film Festival, we had a chance to sit down and discuss the new film with its director. The "Christine" that Denis speaks of is Christine Angot, her co-screenwriter and a notable French novelist and playwright.Notebook: So Bright Sunshine In is your first comedy—it’s a sex comedy and it’s often a very funny film. But what struck me about it was how closely linked the humor and the sadness are. Could you talk about...

It’s beginning to look a lot like fall festival season. On the heels of announcements from Tiff and Venice, the 55th edition of the New York Film Festival has unveiled its Main Slate, including a number of returning faces, emerging talents, and some of the most anticipated films from the festival circuit this year.

This year’s Main Slate showcases a number of films honored at Cannes including Ruben Östlund’s Palme d’Or–winner “The Square,” Robin Campillo’s “Bpm,” and Agnès Varda & Jr’s “Faces Places.” Other Cannes standouts, including “The Rider” and “The Florida Project,” will also screen at Nyff.

Read MoreTIFF Reveals First Slate of 2017 Titles, Including ‘The Shape of Water,’ ‘Downsizing,’ and ‘Call Me By Your Name’

Elsewhere, Aki Kaurismäki’s Silver Bear–winner “The Other Side of Hope” and Agnieszka Holland’s Alfred Bauer Prize–winner “Spoor” come to Nyff after Berlin bows.

Robert Pattinson: Actor to play E.T. astronaut. Robert Pattinson to star for Claire Denis If all goes as planned, Robert Pattinson will get to star in French screenwriter-director Claire Denis' recently announced – and as yet untitled – English-language sci-fier, penned by Denis and White Teeth author Zadie Smith and her novelist husband Nick Laird, from an original idea by Denis and writing partner Jean-Pol Fargeau. Among Claire Denis' credits are the interracial love story Chocolat (1988), the sociopolitical drama White Material (2009), and the generally well-regarded Billy Budd reboot Beau Travail (1999), winner of the César Award for Best Cinematography (Agnès Godard). Robert Pattinson, for his part, is best known for playing the veggie vampire in the wildly popular Twilight movies costarring Kristen Stewart and Taylor Lautner. Robert Pattinson, astronaut In Claire Denis' film, Robert Pattinson is slated to play an E.T. astronaut. But what happens to said astronaut? Does...

Neil Armfield.s Holding the Man, Simon Stone.s The Daughter, Jeremy Sims. Last Cab to Darwin and Jen Peedom.s feature doc Sherpa will have their world premieres at the Sydney Film Festival.

The festival program unveiled today includes 33 world premieres (including 22 shorts) and 135 Australian premieres (with 18 shorts) among 251 titles from 68 countries.

Among the other premieres will be Daina Reid.s The Secret River, Ruby Entertainment's. ABC-tv miniseries starring Oliver Jackson Cohen and Sarah Snook, and three Oz docs, Marc Eberle.s The Cambodian Space Project — Not Easy Rock .n. Roll, Steve Thomas. Freedom Stories and Lisa Nicol.s Wide Open Sky.

Festival director Nashen Moodley boasted. this year.s event will be far larger than 2014's when 183 films from 47 countries were screened, including 15 world premieres. The expansion is possible in part due to the addition of two new screening venues in Newtown and Liverpool.

As previously announced, Brendan Cowell...

On My Skin: Barraud Explores the Essence of Monstrosity

There are moments within Antoine Barraud’s sophomore feature Portrait of the Artist that tend to feel enlivened with an arresting strangeness. There is the peripherally entertaining notion of provocative body horror shadowing us while we follow a filmmaker creating his latest project, simultaneously losing his grip on reality. But more often than not, the film feels like a thriller version of Frederick Wiseman’s National Gallery. Barraud’s French language title, Le Dos Rouge (basically The Red Back) was perhaps too literal of a title, and the allusion to Joyce’s classic text (though this is really more ‘as a middle aged man’) gives it a certain extra textual density since Joyce’s novel is an allusion to Daedalus, the man responsible for constructing the Labyrinth which entombed the deadly Minotaur in Greek Mythology.

Bertrand (Bertrand Bonello) is a filmmaker...

New films from Hal Hartley, James Franco, Gus Van Sant among lineup.

Eighteen features - including seven documentaries - have been selected for the Berlinale’s Panorama programme.

Among the selection are new films from Hal Hartley, Doze Niu Chen-Zer, Jk Youn and The Yes Men.

Hartley concludes his filmic trilogy with Ned Rifle while Justin Kelly’s Gus Van Sant-produced debut I Am Michael stars James Franco as a gay activist in the 1980s.

54: The Director’s Cut

USA

By Mark Christopher

With Ryan Phillippe, Salma Hayek, Mike Myers, Sela Ward, Mark Ruffalo

World premiere

Chorus

Canada

By François Delisle

With Sébastien Ricard, Fanny Mallette, Pierre Curzi, Geneviève Bujold

European premiere

Der letzte Sommer der Reichen (The Last Summer of the Rich)

Austria

By Peter Kern

With Amira Casar, Nicole Gerdon, Winfried Glatzeder

World premiere

Dora oder Die sexuellen Neurosen unserer Eltern (Dora or The Sexual Neuroses of Our Parents)

Switzerland / Germany

By Stina Werenfels...

Introducing an interview with Claire Denis at To Be (Cont'd), Darren Hughes notes that her latest film, Voilà l'enchaînement, "is a series of monologues and conversations performed by Norah Krief and Alex Descas, who portray a mixed-race couple whose relationship begins, welcomes children, and disintegrates violently, all within the span of thirty minutes." For the Av Club's Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, "It’s a decidedly minor work, but still sharp in its observations about how relationship dynamics can uncomfortably overlap with issues of class and race." And we have more from Max Nelson in Film Comment. » - David Hudson...

Introducing an interview with Claire Denis at To Be (Cont'd), Darren Hughes notes that her latest film, Voilà l'enchaînement, "is a series of monologues and conversations performed by Norah Krief and Alex Descas, who portray a mixed-race couple whose relationship begins, welcomes children, and disintegrates violently, all within the span of thirty minutes." For the Av Club's Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, "It’s a decidedly minor work, but still sharp in its observations about how relationship dynamics can uncomfortably overlap with issues of class and race." And we have more from Max Nelson in Film Comment. » - David Hudson...

The lineups for the Mavericks, Discovery, and Tiff Kids parts of the Toronto Film Festival were announced, wrapping up a series of lineup announcements for the Toronto International Film Festival.

With the added films, the festival’s entire slate is now a whopping 393 movies. Two hundred eighty-five of those movies are feature films, of which 143 are world premieres.

The Mavericks portion of the festival includes onstage discussions following the screening of each film. Do I Sound Gay? will be followed by a talk between director David Thorpe and sex-advice guru Dan Savage. Also premiering in that space is The 50 Year Argument,...

Bill Murray is coming to Toronto folks. Actually, the film he stars in (Theodore Melfi’s St. Vincent) is having its official World Premiere launch at the jaw-dropping 285 feature film 2014 Tiff line-up. In the final batch of items we finally get the confirmation that 2014′s Palme d’Or Winner Winter Sleep (which gets added along with a trio of others to the Masters Programme) will show, and Tomm Moore’s highly anticipated Song of the Sea (among the four item line-up for Tiff Kids) also lands. Worth mentioning are the sprinkling of add-ons to the various other sections (Marjane Satrapi’s Sundance preemed The Voices, Matt Shakman’s Cut Bank and the world preem of Danis Tanovic’s Tigers) with a Studio Ghibli docu item being fitted into the Tiff Docs, but it is the Discovery Programme that finally takes shape.

The “up-and-comers” include Berlin Film Fest (and future Nyff...

A woman necks passionately with a man in a car. On a plane, a husband kisses the forearm of his wife. A disfigured body is found in a field. In the opening minutes of Claire Denis’ Trouble Every Day (2001), we are offered the three things that make life worth living: sex, love and death. This is nothing new, but leave it to Denis to make the conventional challenging. Unspooling in a particularly Denisian elliptical manner, it is revealed the woman making out in the backseat is Coré (Béatrice Dalle), the sick wife of Doctor Léo (Alex Descas). The nature of her illness isn’t clear, but has something to do with that corpse. Shane (Vincent Gallo) is the wooing husband, who is taking his nymphet bride, June (Tricia Vessey), to Paris on their honeymoon—and also to investigate his increasingly disturbing urges to nibble at her flesh. In an ode...