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Best French Films Ever.
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Francois Pignon (Daniel Auteuil) works for a condom manufacturer. He is an accountant who has been working at the factory for 20 years. A meek uninteresting bore, his wife divorced him two years earlier, his son despises him, and at work his colleagues smirk about how nerdy he is. He learns that he is about to be fired. Back at home, he tells his story to a neighbour called Belone (Michel Aumont). Belon listens and has an idea that will allow Francois to keep his job. Francois simply has to pretend to be gay. His theory is that the condom company will be terrified of the ramifications if it fires a gay man. Belone fabricates photographs that show Pignon being overtly friendly with a leather-clad man. He mails them to workers at the factory. As anticipated, the news spreads quickly, and Pignon's colleagues now assume that his introverted personality is just an attempt to conceal his real self. Santini (Gerard Depardieu) is an HR manager at the factory, who is also a rugby coach and a homophobic bigot He now feels obliged to befriend Pignon. Guillaume (Thierry Lhermitte) reinforces Santini's fears by telling him that he could be fired for political incorrectness. Meanwhile, Pignon's co-workers are intrigued by the new Francois Pignon. For example, his female boss found him tedious when he was straight, but is keen to seduce him now. As planned, the company fears a lawsuit, and feels obliged to keep him. Better still he is now universal acknowledged as an unusually interesting person. Very funny. Light entertainment with most of the humour coming from people's reactions - especially the Gerard Depardieu character who has to make an effort to be politically correct. An incisive look at bigotry and political correctness, with some insights into French corporate life. Incidentally, the character name François Pignon has been used in four other films by Francis Veber: L'Emmerdeur (1973), Les Compères (1983), Les Fugitifs (1986), and Le Dîner de cons (1998). It always belongs to an amiable fool.
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Genre: Commedy Drama Cast
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16. La Reine Margot
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First a word of warning. This film is made for French audiences who tend to know rather more about French history than the average Anglo-Saxon audience. Before you watch this film you should
do a little research about the of St. Bartholomew's day
Massacre. Or failing that, here's the very minimum you need
to know to make any sense of this film. Sixteenth century France was riven by religious wars in which Catholics and Protestants (Huguenots) killed each other with the sort of liberal barbarity that has always characterised true believers. Towards the end of the century the immature Catholic King Charles IX was a puppet of his mother, Catherine de Medici. She wanted to marry her daughter Margo de Valois to a Protestant king, Henry of Navarre, hoping that this would bolster an uneasy peace. Unfortunately the wedding provoked the murder of some 50,000 Protestants on the night of August 24 - St. Bartholomew's Day - 1572. (The film is generally religiously neutral, but inexplicably omits to portray the Pope ordering a Te deum and having medal struck to celebrate the murder of the Protestant leader Coligney, after Coligney's severed head was sent to His Holiness.) So to the film: Margot is married early in the film to Henri de Navarre (Daniel Auteuil), the Protestant prince destined to become King Henri IV. As this is a political marriage, they there is no affection between them, their union is for the purpose of ending a religious war. 19-year-old Margot takes a shine to the Marquis de la Mole (Vincent Perez), a nobleman she finds in the streets. Catherine de Medici meanwhile plays politics with her three sons, who mope around like dim spoiled brats. .Catherine maintains her power through them and through violence and poisonings. Her whole family seem rather unconventional and unpleasant, and there are numerous heavy hints about incest. The Bartholomew's Day Massacre is well portrayed, and there is a subplot involving a poisoned book. Any reader, licking his finger to turn the pages of thisbook, will poison himself (pace Umerto Eco's Name of the Rose). When the wrong man picks up the book, the succession to the throne is threatened. The film avoids avoids the vacuity of so many big-screen historical epics, and if anything makes exactly the opposite mistake of expecting extensive historical knowledge from its viewers. Spectacular performances include Virna Lisi as Catherine, Jean-Hughes Anglade as the wimpy King Charles IX and Isabelle Adjani, one of the more remarkable actresses of her generation, who does a fine job of portraying Margot. The movie was trimmed to 143 minutes for foreign audiences. The story is based on a novel by Alexandre Dumas (père). |
Genre: Historical drama. Cast
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17. Betty Blue (UK) (USA)
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Zorg (Jean-Hugues Anglade) is a handyman working at a beach resort in France. He looks after the wooden beach bungalows, leading a quiet life, working during the day and writing a novel in his spare time.
Betty (Béatrice Dalle) walks into his life. Betty is a beautiful but unpredictable young woman. She is stormy as she is gorgeous, given to disturbing tantrums.
Betty discovers the manuscript of a novel Zorg has written. She thinks him a genius and takes on the job of getting it published, an enterprise that provides the film's narrative thread.
After a dispute with the owner of the beach bugalows, Betty throws all of Zorg's furniture out of his own bungalow. Zorg and an old man watch from a distance, and the old man notes locanicly "Your pad will look very Zen now".
Zorg and Betty leave for the city, where they move in with Betty's friend Lisa (Consuelo de Haviland) and her man Eddy (Gerard Darmon) a restaurateur. Betty gets a job at a restaurant. Later Eddy employs Zorg and Betty to run the family's business in the country.
She has persuaded Zorg to get his novel published. But the publishers' rejection slips cause Betty to get more and more frstrated. Betty's increasingly unpredictable and violent behaviour is starting to get out of control, and the rest of the film concentrates on how Zorg deals with the consequences.
This is an extraordinarily sensual film with its own unsettling integrity. Beineix writes purple film noir dialogue, matched by a cenematic style full of crane shots and gliding camera shots. The music also works well, especially the evocative sound of saxaphone and harmonica.
Like Zorg, we are seduced by Betty's bright eyes, sensual mouth and unpredictable ways. When Zorg says "I'll eat chili no matter how hot it is," we have as little idea as he does how hot it can get. One reviewer has aptly described this movie as a "devastating combination of French farce and Greek tragedy".
Dalle finds with astonishing accuracy the essence of her role - one that will leave you unsettled for life if you have ever experienced a personality anything like Betty's.
The story is based on a novel by
Philippe Djian
Genre: romance, drama.
Year: 1986
Runtime: 120 min /
France:185 min (director's cut)
Director: Jean-Jacques Beineix
Country: France
Writing credits:
Philippe Djian (novel)
Jean-Jacques Beineix
Produced by
Jean-Jacques Beineix — producer
Claudie Ossard — producer
Original Music: Gabriel Yared
Cinematography: Jean-François Robin
Colour: Fujicolor
Sound Mix: Mono
Cast:
Jean-Hugues Anglade — Zorg
Béatrice Dalle — Betty
Gérard Darmon — Eddy
Consuelo De Haviland — Lisa
Clémentine Célarié — Annie
Jacques Mathou — Bob
Vincent Lindon — Richard le jeune
policier
Catherine D'At
Claude Aufaure — Le médecin
Louis Bellanti — Mario
Dominique Besnehard — Client pizzeria
Raoul Billerey — Le vieux policier
Nathalie Dalyan — Maria
Nicolas Jalowyj — Le petit Nicolas
André Julien — Le vieux Georges
Daniel Millot
Marthe Moudiki-Moreau
Bernard Robin — Deuxième locataire
Claude Confortès — Propriétaire
des bungalows
Philippe Laudenbach — L'éditeur,
Le gynéco
Leonie Berthuit — La morte
Frédéric Caratini — Archie
Raymond Julien — Le vieux type décès
Jacky Galibert — L'infirmier musclé
complete version only
Jean-Pierre Bisson — Le commissaire
Dominique Pinon — Le dealer/Dope
dealer
Bernard Hug
Fabien Béhar
Simon de La Brosse
Franck-Olivier Bonnet
Eugène Berthier
Christine Datnowsky
Claude Duneton
Jessica Forde
Rabah Loucif
Bernadette Palas
Laurence Renn
Stéphane Verbiest
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18. Le Grand Bleu
(The Big Blue)
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There are two versions of this film, a longer version with music by Eric Serra and a shorter US version with music by Bill Conti. These are two completely different films. The longer version of generally reckonned to be a masterpiece. The shorter is a rather tedious shambolic mess.
We meet Enzo and Jacques as two little boys on the Greek coast. They are not friends, but they have a powerful bond in their love of free diving.
The years go by. Enzo and Jacques grow up and lose contact.
Johanna (Rosanna Arquette), a claims adjuster in an insurance office, has to go to Peru on a job. There she comes across Jacques (Jean-Marc Bar) now a young man who works for a group of scientist. He dives for several minutes into an ice cold lake while the scientists monitor his bodily reactions. Jacques is an unusually taciturn Frenchman with a dolphinlike heart rates and oxygen consumption.
Joanna, taken with Jacques, follows him around the world championship diving circuit. She fabricates a story so that her company will let her go to Italy, where she can see Jacques again.
Jacques and Enzo (Jean Reno) are still competitive - especially Enzo the world free diving champion, who knows that Jacques is his only real competition.
Johanna and Jacques become friends, but Jacques cannot commit himself to her. This is a man who carries photographs of his dolphin family in his wallet, yet also realises that this is not entirely normal.
Joanna wants to have Jacques' baby, but Jacques is drawn to his true home, the sea. The rivalry between Jacques and Enzo pushes both men to dangerous depths.
This is the visual equivalent of poetry - deep, unsettling poetry. It has the narritive grip of the Ancient Mariner and takes us into crystal blue uncharted waters and drags us down to dark unplumbed depths.
The film is about belonging - about our natural desire to be where we feel at home. At one level it's about an atavistic desire to return to our ancient past as marine mamals. Who does not feel empathy for dolphins. But it also works as a parable - the choice between the wide open mysterious sea and a mundane family life.
The story, according to Besson, was inspiredby a three-hour ride with a dolphin during his boyhood.
Magic.
Genre: romance, drama.
Year: 1988
Runtime: 119 min. Extended version 168 min. Original
cut in France:132 min.
France:185 min (director's cut)
Country: France / USA / Italy
Director: Luc Besson
Writing credits:
Luc Besson (story & screenplay)
Robert Garland (screenplay)
Marilyn Goldin (screenplay)
Jacques Mayol (screenplay)
Marc Perrier (screenplay)
Produced by
Monty Diamond — line producer: NY
Patrice Ledoux — producer
Claude Besson — executive producer (uncredited)
Luc Besson — co-producer (uncredited)
Bernard Grenet — line producer (uncredited)
Original Music: Eric Serra
Bill Conti (US version)
Cinematography: Carlo Varini
Colour: Eastmancolor
Sound Mix:
70 mm 6-Track (70 mm prints)
Dolby SR (35 mm prints)
Cast
Rosanna Arquette — Johana Baker
Jean-Marc Barr — Jacques Mayol
Jean Reno — Enzo Molinari
Paul Shenar — Dr. Laurence
Sergio Castellitto — Novelli
Jean Bouise — Uncle Louis
Marc Duret — Roberto
Griffin Dunne — Duffy
Andréas Voutsinas — Priest
Valentina Vargas — Bonita
Kimberly Beck — Sally
Patrick Fontana — Alfredo
Alessandra Vazzoler — La Mamma (Enzo's
Mother)
Geoffrey Carey — Supervisor
Bruce Guerre-Berthelot — Young Jacques
Gregory Forstner — Young Enzo
Claude Besson — Jacques' Father
Marika Gevaudan — Angelica
Jan Rouiller — Noireuter
Pierre Semmler — Franck
Jacques Lévy — Doctor
Eric Do — Japanese Diver
André Germe — Philippino Diver
Ronald Teuhi — Tahitian Diver
Rosario Campese — Waiter
Franco Diogene — Receptionist
Tredessa Dalton — Carol
Constantin Alexandrov — Dolphin Trainer
Pierre-Alain de Garrigues — Superintendent
Claude Robin — Taxi Driver
Paul Herman — Taxi Driver in U.S.A
Nicolas Maltos — Diving Coordinator
on Platform
Marc Planceon — Paramedic
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19. La Controverse de Valladolid
A masterpiece, dealing with a subject which was once of great interest but which seems remote and bizarre to modern western minds.
The film opens with Dominican and Franciscan friars filing into a church, along with a Cardinal (Jean Carmet). But this is not any church. It is the Franciscan friary church at Valladolid, the capital of Spain in 1550 when this film is set.
The friars are not just here to pray. They are here to participate in the Controverse de Valladolid, one of the most significant debates in the history of western Christendom. Presiding is the cardinal who is also a papal legate.
The debate is being held to determine whether American Indians possess human souls. In other words to decide whether they are human or animal. The decision will determine how native American peoples will be treated by the Catholic world.
On one side of the nave is a Dominican, Bartolomé de las Casas (Jean-Pierre Marielle). He has lived in Mexico, and is haunted by the horrors he witnessed there. Facing him is Ginèse de Sepúlveda (Jean-Louis Trintignant) a skilled Aristotelian philosopher. He puts the case that American Indians are less than human, that they cannot reason or understand the One True Religion, and that they do not posses human instincts or emotions. Hence they can legitimately be killed or used as beasts of burden.
This is a serious heavy-wieght battle between two sincere articulate men. The tension between them is palpable.
Gradually, we are drawn into their battle, and start to understand their positions. The movie cleverly takes us out of our modern certainties to a time when this was a genuine pressing question and the overwhelming majority of Christians did not share the views of modern Europeans. Of course, now we all think we know the answer to the question of whether native American peoples are human, but how much closer are we to defining what it is that makes a human being a human being ? When we come to think about it we tend to revisit ground familiar to Bartolomé de las Casas and Ginèse de Sepúlveda: Is it our intelligence that makes us human ? Or is it our physical form ? Or language ? Or sense of humour ? Or technology ? Or beliefs and practices?
All of the action of the film takes place in the Fransiscan friary, and almost all of it in the Church. Despite this, the action is vivid and rivetting. There is even humour and some clever twists - as when a pagan idol, specially shipped from Mexico, is brought into the church to prove a point.
Incidentally, this film was made as a movie for a French TV channel. It is based on real arguments from the period. This debate is not a genuine historical event - at least in the way it is shown in the film. Rather, the arguments between the two protagonists were conducted in the form of books and letters.
The film is based on a book of the same name by Jean-Claude Carrière, who points out that although the debate is invented, the arguments are taken from contemporary documents - even much of the phraseology. Accounts of Bartolomé de las Casas's time in the Americas are taken from a history written by the real, sixteenth century Bartolomé de las Casas. He had been a bishop in Mexico and personally witnesed the horrors that he recorded in his history, and that his character relates in this movie. Ginèse de Sepúlveda was a cannon at Cordova, the author of Democrates alter, sive de justice belli causis justifying the conquest and enslavement of the American Indians.
Details of the book (in French) are available below:
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Genre: Historical Drama
Year: 1992
Runtime: 90 min
Country: France
Director: Jean-Daniel Verhaeghe
Writing credits: Jean-Claude Carrière
Produced by:
Céline Baruch — executive producer
Iris Carrière — producer
Hervé Lavayssière — supervising producer
Albert Roguenant — associate producer
Original Music: ???
Non-Original Music: ???
Cinematography: Gérard Vigneron
Colour: Colour
Sound Mix: Dolby
Cast
Jean-Pierre Marielle — Bartolomé
de las Casas
Jean-Louis Trintignant — Ginèse
de Sepúlveda
Jean Carmet — Le Légat du
Pape
Jean-Michel Dupuis — Le Colon
Claude Laugier — Frère Ambrosiano
Pascal Elso — Frère Emiliano
Franck Laigneau — Le jeune moine
au claquoir
Michel Charrel — Le deuxième
colon
Dominique Noé — Un assesseur
du légat
Jean Nehr — Assistant de Las Casas
Didier Bourguignon — Le scribe
Mogan Mehlem — Représentant
du Roi
Raymond Aulme — Un dominicain
Jean-Paul Egalon — Le soldat
Emmanuel-Georges Delajoie — L'ouvrier
africain
Jean-Luc Orofino — Bouffon "Le
Roi"
Salim Talbi — Bouffon "La Reine"
Jean-Eric Allal — Un Civil
Antoine Coesens — Assistant Sépulveda
Lucilla Diaz — L'Indienne
Louis Dedessus Le Moutier — Antipodiste
Enrique Pinedo-Ramirez — L'Indien
Alain Prévost — Bouffon "La
Moine"
Punaa Protch — Le Petit Fille
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20. Amélie
Amelie (UK)
The Fabulous Destiny of Amelie Poulain (USA)
Amelie from Montmartre, also Amelie of Montmartre
Die Fabelhafte Welt der Amelie (Germany)
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Amélie (Audrey Tautou) is a waitress in a Montmartre café. She is shy and oddly elf-like.
She has had a miserable childhood, growing up starved of affection. Her father, a doctor, never hugs or kisses her. Her mother dies when she is hit by a suicide who has jumped off the top of the Cathedral of Notre Dame.
The death of Princess Diana changes her life. The news causes Amelie to drop a bottle top, which rather improbably losens a tile in the wall of her apartment. She discovers an old box containing the treasures of a little boy, hidden there long ago.
She decides to track down the little boy who hid the box, now a grown man, and return his hidden treasures to him. The return is a great success.
Amelie has discovered her life's work: She wants to make people happy by other strange strategems. She will henceforth devote herself to devising plots to make people happy. This here mission, her role in life
She devises other acts of kindness: for example painting word-pictures for a blind man, and pretending to find old love letters from a dead husband to his widow. She enriches the lives of all around her with her ellfin magic.
Amélie is looking for love.. She meets Nino (Mathieu Kassovitz) a mysterious Photomaton-image collector, and takes a liking to him.
This film is a lighthearted joy of a movie. After you've seen it you will find yourself thinking about it days aftwards, smiling at Amélie kindlyl mischiefs. It is full of comic excursions. For example when Amelie stands on the terrace at Montmartre she wonders how many people in Paris are having orgasms at that moment. And hey presto! We see them, all 15 of them, in a quick succession of climaxes.
The movie is set in Paris - not the real Paris, but the unrealistic version of Paris beloved of tourists and film directors, clean, bright, orderly and free of all unpleasantness.
Jean-Pierre Jeunet specialises in films of astonishing visual invention like this. Others on this site include Delicatessen and The City of Lost Children.
A clever, unconventional, light-hearted comedy - another triumph for Jeunet.
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance
Year: 2001
Runtime: Runtime: 122 min, France:129 min
France:185 min (director's cut)
Country: France & Germany
Director: Jean-Pierre Jeunet
Writing credits:
Guillaume Laurant story
Jean-Pierre Jeunet scenario
Guillaume Laurant (screenplay)
Produced by Alain Terzian
Helmut Breuer — co-producer
Jean-Marc Deschamps — producer
Arne Meerkamp van Embden — producer: Germany
Claudie Ossard — executive producer
Claudie Ossard — producer
Original Music: Yann Tiersen
Non-Original Music
Samuel Barber (from "Adagio for Strings")
Georges Delerue (from "Jules et Jim")
Cinematography: Bruno Delbonnel
Colour: Black and White / Duboicolor
Sound Mix: DTS / Dolby Digital
Cast
Audrey Tautou — Amélie Poulain
Mathieu Kassovitz — Nino Quincampoix
Rufus — Raphaël Poulain
Lorella Cravotta — Amandine Poulain
Serge Merlin — Raymond Dufayel
Jamel Debbouze — Lucien
Clotilde Mollet — Gina
Claire Maurier — Suzanne
Isabelle Nanty — Georgette
Dominique Pinon — Joseph
Artus de Penguern — Hipolito
Yolande Moreau — Madeleine Wallace
Urbain Cancelier — Collignon
Maurice Bénichou — Dominique
Bretodeau
Michel Robin — Mr. Collignon
Andrée Damant — Mrs. Collignon
Claude Perron — Eva
Armelle — Philomène
Ticky Holgado — Man in photo (who
describes Amelie to Nino)
Kevin Fernandes — Bretodeau as a
Child
Flora Guiet — Amélie (6 Years
Old)
Amaury Babault — Nino (As a Child)
André Dussollier — Narrator/Récitant
(voice)
Eugène Berthier — Eugène
Koler
Marion Pressburger — Credits Helper
Charles-Roger Bour — The Urinal Man
Luc Palun — Amandine's Grocer
Fabienne Chaudat — Woman in Coma
Dominique Bettenfeld — The Screaming
Neighbor
Jacques Viala — The Customer Who
Humiliates His Friend
Fabien Béhar — The Humiliated
Customer
Jonathan Joss — The Humiliated Customer's
Son
Jean-Pierre Becker — The Bum
Jean Darie — The Blind Man
Thierry Gibault — The Endive Client
François Bercovici — His Buddy
Franck Monier — Dominique Bredoteau
Kid
Guillaume Viry — The Vagrant
Valérie Zarrouk — Dominique
Bredoteau Woman
Marie-Laure Descoureaux — The Dead
Man's Concierge
Sophie Tellier — Aunt Josette
Gérald Weingand — The Teacher
François Viaur — The Bar Owner
Paule Daré — His Employee
Marc Amyot — The Stranger
Myriam Labbé — The Tobacco
Buyer
Jean Rupert — Nasal operation man
Frankie Pain — The Newsstand Woman
Julianna Kovacs — Grocer's Client
Philippe Paimblanc — Train Ticket
Taker
Mady Malroux — One of the Twins
Monette Malroux — One of the Twins
Robert Gendreu — Cafe Patron
Valériane de Villeneuve — The
Laughing Woman
Isis Peyrade — Samantha
Raymonde Heudeline — Phantom Train
Customer
Christiane Bopp — Woman by the Merry-Go-Round
Thierry Arfeuillères — Statue
Man
Jerry Lucas — The Sacré-Coeur
Boy
Patrick Paroux — The Street Prompter
François Aubineau — The Concierge's
Postman
Philippe Beautier — Poulain's Postman
Karine Asure — Pretty Girl at Appointment
Régis Iacono — Félix
L'Herbier
Franck-Olivier Bonnet — Palace Video
(voice)
Alain Floret — The Concierge's Husband
(voice)
Jean-Pol Brissart — The Postman (voice)
Frédéric Mitterrand —
Himself
Manoush — Nymphomaniac woman
Jacques Thébault — Voice-Over
(voice)
Rudy Galindo — Himself (archive footage)
Sam 'Peg Leg' Jackson — Himself (archive
footage)
Jean-Michel Larqué — Himself
(voice) (archive footage)
Thierry Roland — Himself (voice)
(archive footage)
Sister Rosetta Tharpe — Herself (archive
footage)
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