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Why Was Aishwarya Rai Dropped From Some Key Blockbusters With Shah Rukh Khan? (Photo Credit – Instagram)

Shah Rukh Khan and Aishwarya Rai have collaborated on three blockbuster films: Mohabbatein, Devdas, and Josh. The fans highly appreciated their on-screen pairing, especially in Mohabbatein and Devdas.

However, a professional roadblock between them later in their professional lives led to Shah Rukh Khan allegedly dropping Aishwarya from some films where he was the lead actor. In an interview with Simi Garewal on her show Rendezvous, Aishwarya claimed that Shah Rukh Khan dropped her from at least five films, including Veer Zaara and Chalte Chalte.

It was reported that Rani Mukerji‘s role in Veer Zaara was for Aishwarya, but the latter was allegedly removed from the film at Srk’s insistence. When asked if the reports of Srk dropping her from the movies were true, Aishwarya simply replied that she didn’t have any answer,...

Elizabeth MacRae, who played girlfriends of Gomer Pyle and Festus Haggen on television and a woman who seduces Gene Hackman’s surveillance expert in The Conversation, has died. She was 88.

MacRae died Monday in Fayetteville, North Carolina, where she was raised, her family announced.

MacRae showed up as Lou-Ann Poovie on 15 episodes of the CBS comedy Gomer Pyle: Usmc during its final three seasons (1966-69). She was signed to work just one episode, “Love’s Old Sweet Song,” on the Jim Nabors starrer but impressed producers enough to stick around for more.

Earlier, she portrayed April Clomley, the girlfriend of deputy marshal Festus (Ken Curtis), on CBS’ Gunsmoke on four installments from 1962-64.

In The Conversation (1974), written and directed by Francis Ford Coppola, MacRae played Meredith, who dances with Hackman’s Harry Caul in his apartment, sleeps with him and then swipes one of his audiotapes. The actress was among...

Elizabeth MacRae, known for her recurring roles in General Hospital and Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C., has died. She was 88.

MacRae died on May 27 in Fayetteville, North Carolina, where she grew up.

After graduating, MacRae pursued a career in acting and auditioned for Otto Preminger’s production of Saint Joan in 1956. Although she didn’t land a role, she continued to pursue acting. She moved to New York City where she studied with Uta Hagen at the Herbert Berghof Studio and gained experience in off-Broadway productions.

MacRae landed her first television role playing a witness in the courtroom series The Verdict Is Yours. Over a career that spanned 25 years, MacRae would be featured in television shows like Route 66, Surfside 6, Rendezvous, The Fugitive, Judd for the Defense, Gunsmoke, Bonanza, I Dream of Jeannie, The Andy Griffith Show, and many more.

One of her most prominent roles was in Gomer Pyle,...

Denis Villeneuve took the world by storm with his epic Dune franchise, which will eventually see the release of a third iteration. However, the director in himself is not staying put and is already working on another potential fantasy franchise which is bound to excite fans. The director revealed in a recent interview that he has an adaptation based on Arthur C. Clarke’s 1973 science-fiction novel, Rendezvous with Rama, in the works.

Timothée Chalamet and Zendaya in Dune. | Warner Bros.

The novel, which focuses on an interstellar object that enters the solar system in 2131, revolves around Jimmy Pak, an explorer aboard the spaceship The Endeavor. Pak and his team is sent to investigate the 50-km-long spaceship that has entered the solar system.

The novel in itself includes everything a space fantasy series might need. Humungous-spider-like alien creatures, large spaceships akin to Star Wars, the existence of cultural and religious notions...

Exclusive: London-based sales outfit Rapt Films International has acquired worldwide sales rights to Benjamin Howard’s debut US film Riley and will launch sales at the upcoming Cannes Market.

The pic charts the life of a talented teenage athlete who begins to unravel when his burgeoning queer identity competes against his idea of what it means to be a man. The film stars Jake Holley (Wake) as the titular Dakota Riley. Supporting roles are filled by Colin McCalla), Riley Quinn Scott, Connor Storrie, and Rib Hillis.

Based on writer-director Howard’s real-life experiences as a high-school American football player struggling to come out, Riley is a feature expansion of Howard’s UCLA graduate short film Rendezvous. Howard’s other short film Deviant won a Student Emmy Award in 2019.

Riley originally world premiered at September’s Calgary International Film Festival. Additional festival selections have seen...

More than 100 men working in the French film world have written an open letter in support of the #MeToo movement.

Signatories include filmmakers Jacques Audiard, Abderrahmane Sissako, Cyril Dion, Eric Lartigau, and Emmanuel Mouret, alongside actors such as Mathieu Amalric, Anatomy Of A Fall’s Swann Arlaud, and Reda Kateb.

France Televisions’ head of cinema Manuel Alduy, producer Marc Missonnier, and designer Christian Lacroix have also added ther names.

The letter, spearheaded by actress Anouk Grinberg’s husband and mathematician Michel Broué and published on Elle magazine’s website, stated “it is revolting that theatre and cinema should be used...

More than 100 men working in the French film world have written an open letter in support of the #MeToo movement.

Signatories include filmmakers Jacques Audiard, Abderrahmane Sissako, Cyril Dion, Eric Lartigau, and Emmanuel Mouret, alongside actors such as Mathieu Amalric, Anatomy Of A Fall’s Swann Arlaud, and Reda Kateb.

France Televisions’ head of cinema Manuel Alduy, producer Marc Missonnier, and designer Christian Lacroix have also added ther names.

The letter, spearheaded by actress Anouk Grinberg’s husband and mathematician Michel Broué and published on Elle magazine’s website, stated “it is revolting that theatre and cinema should be used...

A record 54 market premieres will be hosted at the Rendez-Vous showcase held by the French film promotion org Unifrance in Paris which will kick off Jan. 16 with the world premiere of Pascal Bonitzer’s “Auction.”

The biggest film market dedicated exclusively to French movies, the Rendez-Vous in Paris will welcome 420 buyers from 50 countries and 47 sales companies. As many as 1,000 professionals have registered for the week-long event. Since Unifrance has now merged with TV France International, the event will also gather 100 TV buyers from 27 countries.

“After returning last year with a post-pandemic edition, we’re back to normal with over 400 buyers — and we even have new buyers from Quebec and Africa, along with about 15 Latin American distributors,” said Gilles Renouard, Unifrance’s co-managing director.

More than 80 completed movies will screen at the Rendez-Vous, 54 of which have never been shown at an international festival or market. Renouard says the large roster of...

Each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit streaming platforms in the United States. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.

Jackass Forever (Jeff Tremaine)

Jackass has been in our lives for more than two decades. Since October 2000, when the original show premiered on MTV, Johnny Knoxville and his gaggle of goofballs have appealed to lowest-common-denominator comedic impulses. They’ve slammed their testicles into things and had them slammed into by other things. They’ve gleefully dove into danger and gotten legitimately hurt. They’ve aggravated and disturbed an entire generation of people who got Reagan and Clinton elected. But then, for another generation, they brought laughter and some earnest sense of camaraderie. Since the halcyon days of the show (which Knoxville quickly ended himself after the ire of a boomer nation called for censorship), Jackass has endured in cinematic form. The first...

When it comes to telling stories, most filmmakers prefer to let the material do the talking. That was the case for the six Oscar-nominated directors of doc shorts who gathered with TheWrap’s Executive Awards Editor, Steve Pond, as part of TheWrap’s 2022-2023 Awards Season Screening Series: Kartiki Gonsalves (“The Elephant Whisperers”), Evgenia Arbugaeva and Maxim Arbugaev (“Haulout”), Anne Alvergue (“The Martha Mitchell Effect”), Jay Rosenblatt (“How Do You Measure a Year?”) and Joshua Seftel (“Stranger at the Gate”).

For Gonsalves, whose film focuses on a couple from a small village in southern India who rescues an orphaned elephant, less was more. “I just wanted ‘The Elephant Whisperers’ to let viewers understand both the elephant and the human carers with very little, almost minimal outside interpretation,” she said. “I was really trying to focus on the dignity of both the elephants and the indigenous people who have literally lived...

Mubi has announced its lineup of streaming offerings for next month, including an epic six-film series dedicated to the brand new restorations of the films of Nina Menkes. The slate also includes a Brian De Palma double bill with Obsession and Body Double as well as Paul Schrader’s Hardcore.

Additional highlights include the Andrea Riseborough-led Please Baby Please, three films by Eugene Kotlyarenko, a Ghost in the Shell double bill, and, ahead of their release of Passages later this year, Ira Sach’s Little Men.

Check out the lineup below and get 30 days free here.

March 1 – Glass Life, directed by Sara Cwynar | Brief Encounters

March 2 – The Great Sadness of Zohara, directed by Nina Menkes | Phantom Cinema: The Films of Nina Menkes

March 3 – Please Baby Please, directed by Amanda Kramer | Mubi Spotlight

March 4 – Hardcore, directed by Paul Schrader

March 5 – Kedi, directed by Ceyda Torun

March 6 – Magdalena Viraga, directed by...

Unifrance and Film at Lincoln Center have unveiled the lineup for the 28th edition of Rendez-Vous With French Cinema, an annual celebration of contemporary French filmmaking. The event will take place March 2–12.

It kicks off with a screening of Alice Winocour’s “Revoir Paris,” which stars Virginie Efira as a translator named Mia, who survived a mass shooting in a Paris restaurant and is unable to resume life as usual. In an effort to regain a sense of normalcy, Mia returns repeatedly to the site of the shooting, forming bonds with her fellow survivors. Efira is best known for her star turn in Paul Verhoeven’s “Benedetta.”

“It is a such a pleasure to open this year’s edition with the French critical and box-office hit ‘Revoir Paris’ in the presence of director Alice Winocour and actress Virginie Efira, who just received our French Cinema Award in Paris,” said Daniela Elstner,...

Jack Harlow is headed back to 30 Rock for a special gig: Co-hosting The Tonight Show.

Harlow will help Jimmy Fallon helm the late-night institution next Thursday, Oct. 6. Harlow’s duties so far will include delivering the opening monologue with Fallon, co-interviewing guest Dwyane Wade, and introducing musical guests Quavo and Takeoff.

Harlow has appeared on The Tonight Show a handful of times. Back in December 2020, he shared a performance of two songs — “Rendezvous” and “Way Out” — from his debut album, That’s What They All Say. This past May, he...

Our friends at Cinefantasy, the genre film festival in Brazil, have written us to let us know what their plans are for this year's edition and what films made the cut for the lineup.    The health crisis still looms and Cinefantasy will hold a hybrid edition this year. In person screenings will be held at Cineteatro Sao Luiz and online screenings will happen on the Innsaie platform.    The lineup includes some familiar titles to ScreenAnarchy. We've spoken highly of Luz: The Flower of Evil and Rendez-Vous in the past. We've listed all nineteen feature films in a gallery down below, every one of them with a trailer!    The bulk of the programming is made up of documentaries and short films which follow...

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

We are pleased to announce the opening date of award winning horror thriller Rendez-vous. Written and directed by Pablos Olmos Arrayales the film will be released by Level 33 Entertainment on Digital | Video On Demand starting February 12, 2021. Shot in one single take with no cuts Rendez-vous is an original Mexican thriller from about a couple who meet online. One night. One chance to fall in …

The post Level 33 Entertainment releases Mexican horror thriller Rendez-vous from writer director Pablos Olmos Arrayales on February 12, 2021! appeared first on Horror News | Hnn.

Grimmfest have today announced the launch of their Grimmfest Easter Edition, a new annual event taking place over the Easter Weekend, and complimenting the long-established festival in October.

Easter is traditionally a time for rebirth, renewal, resurrection. But as the Pandemic continues to rage, and the world remains on lockdown for the foreseeable future, it is also a time for rethinking. Thus, while the Grimmfest team had hoped to be hosting a ‘live’ Easter event, instead, the Grimmfest Easter Edition will be taking place online, and will build on the success of Grimmfest 2020 online experience.

The festival will open on Thursday April 1st with our preview night that will feature the UK premiere of Kourosh Ahari’s surreal and sulphurous Iranian American haunted hotel horror The Night, which has already earned deserved comparisons to Kubrick’s The Shining, alongside the UK premiere of Lluis Danes’ visually ravishing reimagining of the...

The Amstelveen-born helmer’s new film, an adaptation of her book of the same name, stars Elise Schaap, Pierre Bokma, Maarten Heijmans and Stefan Rokebrand in the lead roles. Antoinette Beumer’s new film, a drama entitled My Father Is an Airplane, is currently in post-production. This is the director’s seventh feature, following her most recent productions Rendez-Vous (2015), Soof (2013) and Jackie (2012). Her best-known works are The Happy Housewife (2010), starring Carice van Houten as a woman who has trouble adjusting to the birth of her son, and Loft (2010), a remake of the 2008 Belgian film of the same name, Loft. The script, penned by Maaik Krijgsman (The Good Terrorist), is based on Beumer’s debut novel of the same name, which was published by Lebowski in 2018. The book garnered many great reviews and won the prestigious Hebban Debut Award. According to the synopsis, when her mother unexpectedly dies,...

Rendez-Vous with French Cinema (January 16-20), the annual Paris showcase of upcoming French movies, looks set to go ahead without major disruption despite the continued wave of transport strikes across France, according to organizer Unifrance.

A spokesperson for the French cinema promotion org said that because all aspects of the Rendez-Vous were contained in the same area, including the market and screenings, it should not be unduly affected and that they are “keeping fingers crossed” for a smooth event.

The train and rail strikes erupted after the French government’s proposed reforms to pension schemes. Since the industrial action began on December 5, the country has seen widespread disruption including on its high-speed rail network and the Paris metro. The Eurostar, the train line which connects London and the French capital, has also seen cancellations.

French public transport operator Ratp continues to warn that travel in the capital remains “very disrupted” on its Twitter feed.

The 22nd edition of the UniFrance Rendez-Vous, a five-day showcase of French movies in Paris, is set to kick off with Martin Provost’s 1960s-set film “How To Be A Good Wife” starring Juliette Binoche.

Handled by Memento Films International, “How To Be A Good Wife” weaves comedy and drama as it takes place during the May 1968 riots and centers on an all-girls school in Eastern France where teenagers were trained to become perfect housewives. The movie was produced by Les Films du Kiosque.

The world’s biggest industry showcase of French films, the event will screen 184 local movies and co-productions.

Running Jan. 16 through Jan. 20, the UniFrance Rendez-Vous will bring together 389 international buyers, including distributors and acquisition executives working for streaming services and TV groups, on top of 30 exhibitors from 49 countries, as well as 44 sales companies. More than 120 French actors and filmmakers, as well as 115 journalists are also expected to...

With a seemingly endless amount of streaming options—not only the titles at our disposal, but services themselves–each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit platforms. Check out this week’s selections below and an archive of past round-ups here.

Before we get to our weekly streaming picks, check out our annual feature: Where to Stream the Best Films of 2019.

Cold Case Hammarskjöld (Mads Brügger)

In 1961, Secretary-General of the United Nations Dag Hammarskjöld was killed in a plane crash in Africa under mysterious circumstances. Beginning as an investigation into his still-unsolved death, the trail that Mads Brügger follows in Cold Case Hammarskjöld is one that expands to implicate some of the world’s most powerful governments in unfathomably heinous crimes. Without revealing the specifics of the jaw-dropping revelations in this thoroughly engrossing documentary, if there’s any justice, what is brought to light will cause global...

The production is an adaption of the 1968 play by Marguerite Duras.

Screen can reveal the first image of Charlotte Gainsbourg in French director Benoit Jacquot’s upcoming drama Suzanna Andler, which is currently shooting in southern France.

The production is an adaptation of a1968 play by French writer and playwright Marguerite Duras. Set in the 1960s, Gainsbourg plays Suzanna, a 40-years-old woman trapped in an upper class marriage, who will have to choose between her life as a wife and mother governed by the conventions of the time, and a more carefree existence, embodied by her young lover, played by co-star Niels Schneider.

Juliette Binoche jetted into Macao today (December 9) to take part in a masterclass in which she discussed her career working with many of the international biz’s greatest directors.

The French actress is a talent ambassador for the 2019 International Film Festival & Awards Macao (Iffam) and participated in a two-part discussion, initially with festival director Mike Goodridge, and then in a back and forth with Chinese director Diao Yinan, whose The Wild Goose Lake is playing here.

Binoche recalled how revered French director Jean-Luc Godard gave her one of her initial breaks in the industry when he cast her in his 1985 drama Hail Mary.

“We stayed in a hotel for three to four months, he [Godard] would shoot whenever he wanted to,” said Binoche. “Sometime we would go on set, and he would say ‘no’. It was informative, sometimes making a scene has to come from a deep place – it’s not just a machine for him,...

Lili is excited and nervous about her date with Eduardo. She me him on an online dating service app. The night starts a little rocky at first, Eduardo is half an hour late and not answering his phone. He finally arrives and the date goes on. Eduardo is charming, attractive and attentive. The evening is going so well Lili agrees to go back to Eduardo’s home for dinner. Even the best dates can turn sour and Eduardo’s true intentions come to light. With Rendez-vous, writer-director Pablo Olmos Arrayales is in no rush to reveal everyone’s true intentions. The first half plays out like a film from the Linklater Before trilogy. Lili and Eduardo start in an art gallery then walk the streets of Coyoacan...

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

Netflix may get most of the attention, but it’s hardly a one-stop shop for cinephiles who are looking to stream essential classic and contemporary films. Each of the prominent streaming platforms — and there are more of them all the time — caters to its own niche of film obsessives.

From chilling horror fare on Shudder, to the boundless wonders of the Criterion Channel, and esoteric (but unmissable) festival hits on Film Movement Plus and Ovid.tv, IndieWire’s monthly guide will highlight the best of what’s coming to every major streaming site, with an eye towards exclusive titles that may help readers decide which of these services is right for them.

Here’s the best of the best for August 2019.

Amazon Prime

There are some big new movies coming to Amazon Prime this month, but most of these recent Hollywood titles will also be available to stream on Hulu and/or Netflix.

Mubi's retrospective, Juliette Binoche: The Woman with a Thousand Faces, is showing July 14 – September 23, 2019 in the United Kingdom.Les amants du Pont NeufA newly reformed Michèle, played by Juliette Binoche, meets her estranged lover (Denis Lavant) on the Pont Neuf, where years ago the two lived as vagabonds, drinking bum wine into the night, falling asleep nestled into the curves of the bridge’s arced barriers. Once a raggedy drifter, with mangy hair and gooey, dull eyes falling gradually into disrepair, her vision is restored in their conclusive reunion, and we observe a more familiar Binoche donning a clean, boyish bob. Once again, she is the woman of our dreams, a mercurial presence whose eyes—wide-set and a conjuring warm brown—give her tender alabaster beauty a poignant intelligence. She launches into a dirty joke about a group of men discussing how often they have sex. The happiest...

European sales veteran Daniela Elstner, head of Paris-based sales company Doc & Film international, has been appointed as the new managing director of French cinema promotion organization UniFrance.

Elstner replaces Isabelle Giordano who is leaving at the end of July after six years. Her selection was approved unanimously by the organization’s executive committee. She is expected to step down from Doc & Film.

Meanwhile, UniFrance president Serge Toubiana has been unanimously re-elected for another two year term.

UniFrance plays an important role for French industry, especially at major festivals and markets. The organization oversees a number of events promoting French films and talent including Rendez-Vous with French Cinema in Paris; the Rendez-Vous with French Cinema in New York, which is organized in tandem with the Film Society of Lincoln Center; and the French Film Festival in Yokohama, Japan.

Respected exec Elstner has been MD at doc specialist Doc & Film for...

Giordano leaves French cinema promotional body after six years in the role.

Isabelle Giordano is to step down as the managing director of Unifrance at the end of July after six years in the role, the French cinema promotional body has announced.

Giordano took up the role in 2013 and has steered the organisation through a complex time for French cinema internationally, amid the rise of global digital platforms and competition from high-end drama for cinema.

There were no details on Giordano’s replacement or her next role.

Unifrance president Serge Toubiana highlighted the role Giordano had played in raising the...

All day today in Cannes is dedicated to Sylvester Stallone whose 43-year plus storied career is being lauded by the fest. The three-time Oscar nominated filmmaker/actor was at the Hotel du Cap for a junket about Rambo V, sat down for a Masterclass at the Salle Debussy, and will be feted tonight with an early glimpse of the latest Rambo along with a 4K restoration of First Blood.

Mobs of people akin to the throngs at Comic Con crowded the Croisette to get into the Debussy this afternoon for Stallone’s sit-down with Didier Allouch. In typical Cannes fashion, Stallone was greeted with a full house standing ovation as he walked up the aisle to the stage and greeted the audience with a big “Yo”.

While today’s “Rendez-vous with Stallone” was largely about his career, Stallone got a chance to talk up Rambo V: Last Blood which opens on Sept.

Amanda director Mikhaël Hers: "Vincent Lacoste is naturally very intuitive and Stacy Martin, maybe due to her double nationality, is more cerebral, more rational as an actor."

Before the uniFrance and Film Society of Lincoln Center luncheon for the 24th edition of Rendez-Vous with French Cinema in New York - attended by the President of uniFrance Serge Toubiana and Executive Director of uniFrance Isabelle Giordano, Russell Banks, uniFrance’s American ambassador, Sophie Fillières, Agathe Bonitzer, Hélène Fillières, Emmanuel Mouret, Eva Husson, Pierre Salvadori, and Pio Marmaï - Amanda director/screenwriter Mikhaël Hers joined me for a conversation. We spoke about the roles of Vincent Lacoste, Isaure Multrier, Stacy Martin, Marianne Basler, Ophélia Kolb, and Greta Scacchi, dancing to Elvis Presley, film critic Serge Daney's book L'Amateur De Tennis and Mikhaël's love of tennis.

P‪resident of uniFrance‬, Serge Toubiana and Executive Director of uniFrance, Isabelle Giordano with Mikhaël Hers...

An overstretched film producer shoots himself in the head when the bank refuses to extend him the credit he needs for his latest movie, leaving his widow to finish the project. A mediocre 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. A middle-aged professor doesn’t know what to do with herself after her husband leaves her for a younger woman; she’s not unhappy so much as burdened by the unbearable lightness of freedom.

It would be an understatement to say that change does not come naturally to the characters of Mia Hansen-Løve, a 38-year-old auteur whose first six films have established her as one of modern cinema’s most compelling voices — these are people who define themselves by their partners and vocations, and would rather kamikaze their entire lives than dare to adjust course.

P‪resident of uniFrance‬ Serge Toubiana and Russell Banks, uniFrance’s American ambassador for Rendez-Vous with French Cinema, will introduce François Truffaut’s The 400 Blows Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

Bertrand Tavernier is no longer able to attend New York's Rendez-Vous With French Cinema for his conversation with Russell Banks. He has been replaced by Paul Schrader.

Sophie Fillières and Agathe Bonitzer (When Margaux Meets Margaux), Emmanuel Mouret (Mademoiselle de Joncquières), Judith Davis (Whatever Happened to My Revolution), Hélène Fillières (Raising Colors), Pierre Salvadori and Pio Marmaï (The Trouble with You) have been confirmed for the New French Comedies discussion.

Catherine Deneuve with Executive Director of uniFrance Isabelle Giordano Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

Eva Husson (Girls Of The Sun), Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre (The Mustang), Brady Corbet (Vox Lux), and Jean-Stéphane Sauvaire (A Prayer Before Dawn) will participate in Filming Abroad.

“It is a great honour to have Russell Banks as our American ambassador...

Gilles Lellouche’s “Sink or Swim,” Mikhaël Hers’s “Amanda,” Louis-Julien Petit’s “Invisibles” and Eva Husson’s “Girls of the Sun” are set to screen at the 24th edition of the Rendez-Vous with French Cinema showcase which is co-organized by The Film Society of Lincoln Center and UniFrance.

After world-premiering out of competition at the Cannes Film Festival, “Sink or Swim” became a box office hit in France and got nominated for 10 Cesar Awards. The film is headlined by a popular French cast, including Mathieu Amalric (“At Eternity’s Gate”), Guillaume Canet (“Rock’n Roll”), Virginie Efira (“Elle”) and Leila Bekhti (“Midnight Sun”).

“Girls of the Sun,” which competed at Cannes, stars Golshifteh Farahani (“Paterson”) as a resistance fighter part of an all-female battalion made up of former captives of extremists who have vowed to reconquer their own land.

Inspired by a true story, “Invisibles” follows the journey of...

The Film Society of Lincoln Center and UniFrance have announced the complete lineup for the 24th edition of Rendez-Vous with French Cinema, the celebrated annual festival that exemplifies the variety and vitality of contemporary French filmmaking, taking place February 28 – March 10 in New York.

The 2019 Opening Night selection is the New York premiere of “The Trouble with You,” the latest comic whirlwind from Pierre Salvadori (“In the Courtyard”), which was recently nominated for nine César Awards including Best Film, Director, Screenplay, and all four acting categories. A standout of the 2018 Cannes Directors’ Fortnight, this hilarious yet tender film stars Adèle Haenel as a woman coping with the recent loss of her husband, and features supporting performances by Audrey Tautou, Vincent Elbaz, and Damien Bonnard.

“This year’s Rendez-Vous brings together established French filmmakers and exciting emerging talents in a lineup that showcases the artistry and innovation at the heart of French cinema,...

Pyramide International handling sales on film produced by France’s Les Film Pelléas and Versus Productions.

Renowned Russian dancer and actor Sergei Polunin and French actress Laetitia Dosch have joined the cast of Danielle Arbid’s upcoming feature Passion Simple, which began shooting in and around Paris last week.

The film is being shot in 16mm and the shoot will also travel to Moscow and Florence in February.

Dosch co-stars as a French academic who embarks on a passionate affair with a dashing, married Russian diplomat, played by Polunin, knowing that the relationship will not last. The storyline revolves around...

Paris — In his first feature since 2010’s “The Clink of Ice,” filmmaker Bertrand Blier returns with a somber, existentialist farce reminiscent of the last century’s most celebrated absurdist theater.

Vladimir and Estragon, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, meet Taupin and Foster (Gérard Depardieu and Christian Clavier). One is homeless, the other well off, though that dynamic eventually flips. As they ramble the streets of Brussels, the two are constantly met by legions of script supervisors, who deliver them the latest pages and revisions that will inform their next steps.

As in “The Truman Show,” an all-seeing showrunner lies behind the scenes; as in “Six Characters in Search of an Author,” our protagonists sometimes bristle at the roles they have been cast into.

Still, the film’s premise is less an existential treatise than a malleable platform for a series of monologues, dialogues and testy exchanges. More than anything else, “Heavy Duty...

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,...

Kim Longinotto’s film portrays anti-Mafia photographer Letizia Battaglia.

Paris-based feature film sales company Charades and UK documentary specialist MetFilm Sales are teaming up to co-handle Kim Longinotto’s latest feature documentary Shooting The Mafia.

Award-winning British documentarian Longinotto will premiere the work in World Cinema Documentary Competition at the Sundance Film Festival (Jan 24-Feb 3) before travelling to Berlin where it will screen in the Panorama section.

The film is a portrait of Palermo-based photojournalist Letizia Battaglia, who is best known for her iconic images documenting the barbaric acts of the Mafia in her home city of Palermo.

It intercuts Battaglia’s striking black-and-white photographs,...

In the run-up to the UniFrance Rendez-Vous in Paris, the rising sales company Charades has added three French films to its slate, “My Traitor, My Love,” a war romance-drama; “Lost And Found,” a romantic comedy; and “The Girl With a Bracelet,” a family drama.

Directed by Helier Cisterne (“Vandal”), “My Traitor, My Love” (pictured) opens in 1956 in Algeria, at a time when it was a French colony. The film stars hot French actor Vincent Lacoste (“Amanda”) and Vicky Krieps (“Phantom Thread”) as Fernand and Helene, a young couple madly in love whose destiny will be irrevocably changed by the outbreak of the Algerian War of Independence. Fernand is an activist figting for independence alongside the Algerians. The film was penned by Katell Quillévéré (“Heal the Living”) and Cisterne whose feature debut “Vandal” won the Louis Delluc Prize in 2013.

“My Traitor, My Love” is produced by Les Films du Bélier,...

Senegal-set, feel-good drama Yao to market premiere during Unifrance Rendez-vous with French Cinema in Paris this week (Jan 17-21).

Wild Bunch has unveiled a slew of sales for Philippe Godeau’s Senegal-set, feel-good dramaYao, starring Omar Sy as a French-Senegalese writer who returns to his native country for a book tour, ahead of its market premiere during the Unifrance Rendez-vous with French Cinema in Paris this week.

In Europe, it has sold to Benelux (Cineart), Switzerland (Filmcoopi), Spain (Diamond Films), Greece (Spentzos Films), Italy (Cinema Srl), Scandinavia (Njuta), Iceland (Sena Film), ex-Yugoslavia (Fivia), Hungary (Mozinet), Czech Republic (Film Europe), Cis...

Intelligent comedy about women’s liberation tale unfolds in all-girls school against the backdrop of May 1968.

Memento Films International (Mfi) will kick off sales on Martin Provost’s 1960s-set comedy-drama How To Be A Good Wife, starring Juliette Binoche, at the Unifrance Rendez-vous with French Cinema in Paris this week (January 17-21).

Binoche will star as the co-head of an all-girls housekeeping school in a small town in the eastern French region of Alsace in the late 1960s. She runs the school alongside husband with the mission to train teenage girls to become perfect housewives. The schools were common in...

Fireman drama has drawn 1m spectators at the French box office since release late November release.

WTFilms is reporting strong buyer interest in French director Fréderic Tellier’s breakout hit Through The Fire (Sauver ou Périr), starring Pierre Niney as a hero fireman who is badly disfigured while rescuing colleagues from a burning building.

The film has sold to China (Lemon Tree), Canada (A-z Films), Latin America (California Filmes), Hong Kong (Edko), Taiwan (MovieCloud), Korea (EnterMode), Belgium (Athena Films) and Greece (Odeon). Encore has picked it up for airlines.

Paris-based sales company WTFilms is expecting to seal further deals at...

Kicking off on Jan. 17 with the world premiere of Philippe de Chauveron’s “Serial Bad Weddings 2,” the 21st edition of the UniFrance Rendez-Vous in Paris will showcase a flurry of French comedies, biopics and a raft of documentaries.

The Rendez-Vous in Paris, organized by the promotion org UniFrance, will take place over five days and will bring together 481 buyers from 56 countries, as well as 45 French sales companies.

Besides “Serial Bad Weddings 2,” the sequel of the smash hit film which grossed over $148 million, the anticipated comedy highlights set to have their market premieres at the Rendez-Vous include Hugo Gelin’s “Love at Second Sight,” Philippe Lacheau’s “City Hunter,” Eric Lavaine’s “No Filter,” Lisa Azuelos’s “Sweetheart,” Louis-Julien Petit’s “Invisibles” and Bertrand Blier’s “Heavy Duty.”

Sold by Studiocanal, “Love at Second Sight” is a romantic comedy which marks Gelin’s follow-up to the Omar Sy starrer “Two is a Family.

Company to unveil new films by Rebecca Zlotowski, Guillaume Nicloux and Roschdy Zem during Paris Rendez-vous in January.

Wild Bunch will kick-off sales on a quartet of new French films during the Rendez-vous with French Cinema in Paris in January including a coming-of-age tale by Rebecca Zlotowski, starring glamour girl and lingerie designer Zahia Dehar, and Guillaume Nicloux’s new collaboration with cult writer Michel Houellebecq and Gérard Depardieu.

Zlotowski’s An Easy Girl co-stars debutant actress Mina Farid as the naïve 16-year-old Naïma, whose eyes are opened to the world of love, sex and human relationships over a summer...

French writer Christine Angot is well-known in her homeland for a series of autobiographical books (including L’Inceste, Pourquoi le Bresil? and Rendez-vous) that chronicle the abuse she suffered as a child and the life she’s built in the wake of trauma. Filled with searingly honest accounts of her relationships, sexual experiences and psychological states past and present, Angot’s emotionally puissant first-person confessions return time and again to the disturbing events of her youth, reflecting on how they have shaped her evolution as an author and woman.

(In France, Angot is also a highly mediatized public intellectual who has made several ...

French writer Christine Angot is well-known in her homeland for a series of autobiographical books (including L’Inceste, Pourquoi le Bresil? and Rendez-vous) that chronicle the abuse she suffered as a child and the life she’s built in the wake of trauma. Filled with searingly honest accounts of her relationships, sexual experiences and psychological states past and present, Angot’s emotionally puissant first-person confessions return time and again to the disturbing events of her youth, reflecting on how they have shaped her evolution as an author and woman.

(In France, Angot is also a highly mediatized public intellectual who has made several ...

‪The Yellow Birds‬ director ‪Alexandre Moors‬ on Kevin Powers' novel adapted by David Lowery and Ronnie Porto: "The book is beautiful. A beautiful piece of English literature." Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

The Yellow Birds, shot by Sundance award-winner Daniel Landin (Jonathan Glazer's Under the Skin) and edited by Joe Klotz with a a terrific score by Adam Wiltzie, Adam Peters and Marc Ribot, stars Alden Ehrenreich and Tye Sheridan with Jack Huston, Jennifer Aniston (also an executive producer), Toni Collette, Jason Patric, Lee Tergesen, and Olivia Crocicchia.

Alexandre Moors joined me for a conversation on his second feature (after Blue Caprice with Isaiah Washington and Tequan Richmond). The first time I heard about Kevin Powers' novel The Yellow Birds was from the director of Augustine, Alice Winocour when she was in New York for her film Disorder (Maryland) during Rendez-Vous with French Cinema in 2016. Matthias Schoenaerts played Vincent, a soldier returning from.

The 71st Annual Cannes Film Festival is in full swing and I just spend 11 straight hours in theatre seats catching it all.

Christopher Nolan sat for a two hour “Rendez-Vous” , or what used to be called a master class Saturday afternoon at the Bunuel theatre

which was , to put it mildly, a mob scene. You would think Nolan was some kind of rock star considering the lines that stretched across three sets of stairs and three floors just to get to the entrance. Fortunately Warner Bros supplied me with a primo ticket so I was able to fight my way through the crowd and got in . Others in the massive turnaway crowd weren’t as lucky. Having done several interviews with Nolan during the past awards season for Dunkirk, and in previous seasons, I know him pretty well and ran into him just after he landed in Cannes at the...

There are different ways to celebrate the arrival of Spring. But if you are in New York, there is only one way to do it, in style: you go see some great new French films at the Film Society of Lincoln Center. It's a proud tradition around this neck of the woods. The 23rd edition of Rendez-Vous with French Cinema is here with an array of films by established filmmakers and first-timers alike, including Bruno Dumont (Jeannette: The Childhood of Joan of Arc), Mathieu Amalric (Barbara), Raymond Depardon (12 Days), Toni Marshall (Number One), Léonor Serraille (Montparnasse Bienvenüe), Léa Mysius (Ava), just to name a few. Fslc is partnering again with UniFrance this year, putting emphasis on presenting emerging women directors. To quote Executive Director...

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

Lack of EuropaCorp hit sees number dip below 100m.

The international box office for French films recovered some of its élan in 2017 after a difficult 2016, although the absence of a big hit from Luc Besson’s EuropaCorp meant admissions remained well below the 100m of recent years.

According to preliminary annual figures released by export body UniFrance on Friday evening (January 19) as part of its Rendez-vous with French Cinema in Paris programme, French films drew 80.5m spectators internationally in 2017 for a total box office of €468m ($572m).

The international box office also generated more admissions for French cinema than France, where local pictures sold 78.2m tickets in 2017. Unifrance said the 2017 international box office figure represented a 98% rise on 2016 figures, when French films drew 34m spectators worldwide.

Breaking the box office figure down, majority French productions accounted for 60.7m, or 76%, of these admissions. French-language productions generated 38m entries, accounting for 47% of the international box office.

UniFrance noted that French-language...

Documentary specialist is reuniting with French filmmaker on her upcoming documentaries Young Solitude andThe Village.

Source: Wide House

‘Young Solitude’

Paris-based Wide House is reuniting with French filmmaker Claire Simon on her upcoming documentaries Young Solitude and The Village.

The documentary specialist is kicking-off sales on Young Solitude, which will be the first work to come to fruition, at this week’s Unifrance Rendez-vous with French Cinema in Paris.

It captures a group of 16 to 18-year-old teenagers at a high school in a Paris suburb as they chat about their personal history, family, passions, aspirations and sense of loneliness as they approach adulthood.

The film is produced by Paris-based Sophie Dulac Distribution which will also handle the French release.

The sales collaboration continues an on-going relationship between Wide House and Simon, known for her up-close, observational works capturing the human drama in the ordinary.

The company will also continue sales on the director’s last film The Graduation...