YOUR TOP FRENCH FILMS

**Tannhauser** · 10-29-2020, 07:00 PM

Le Scaphandre et le Papillon

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (French: Le Scaphandre et le Papillon) is a 2007 French biographical drama film directed by Julian Schnabel and written by Ronald Harwood. Based on Jean-Dominique Bauby's 1997 memoir of the same name, the film depicts Bauby's life after suffering a massive stroke that left him with a condition known as locked-in syndrome. Bauby is played by Mathieu Amalric.
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly won awards at the Cannes Film Festival, the Golden Globes, the BAFTAs, and the César Awards, and received four Oscar nominations. Several critics later listed it as one of the best films of its decade.[3] It ranks in BBC's 100 Greatest Films of the 21st Century.

Gouttes d'eau sur pierres brûlantes

Water Drops on Burning Rocks (French: Gouttes d'eau sur pierres brûlantes) is a 2000 French drama film directed by François Ozon.[1] The film is based on a German play by Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Tropfen auf heisse Steine.

I... comme Icare (1979)

A prosecutor investigates the key to the operation of a secret organization that has ended the life of a head of state. A film based on the assassination of John Fitzgerald Kennedy and the subsequent investigation into the assassination. César Awards: 5 Nominations including Best Film

Belle de Jour

Belle de Jour is a 1967 drama film directed by Luis Buñuel, and starring Catherine Deneuve, Jean Sorel, and Michel Piccoli. Based on the 1928 novel Belle de jour by Joseph Kessel, the film is about a young woman who spends her midweek afternoons as a high-class prostitute, while her husband is at work.[3]
The title of the film is a pun on the French term, "belle de nuit" ("lady of the night", i.e., a prostitute), as Séverine works during the day under the pseudonym "Belle de Jour". Her nickname can also be interpreted as a reference to the French name of the daylily (Hemerocallis), meaning "beauty of [the] day", a flower that blooms only during the day.
Belle de Jour is one of Buñuel's most successful and famous films. It won the Golden Lion and the Pasinetti Award for Best Film at the Venice Film Festival in 1967

Entre les murs

The Class (French: Entre les murs, lit. 'Between the walls') is a 2008 French drama film directed by Laurent Cantet, based on the 2006 novel of the same name by François Bégaudeau. The novel is a semi-autobiographical account of Bégaudeau's experiences as a French language and literature teacher in a middle school in the 20th arrondissement of Paris, particularly illuminating his struggles with "problem children": Esmerelda (Esmeralda Ouertani), Khoumba (Rachel Regulier), and Souleymane (Franck Keïta). The film stars Bégaudeau himself in the role of the teacher.[2]
The film received the Palme d'Or at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival, making it the first French film to do so since 1987, when Maurice Pialat won the award for Under the Sun of Satan. The Class was also nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, but lost to Departures.

Bonus

François Truffaut's series (5 films) about Antoine Doinel: Les Quatre Cents Coups, Antoine et Colette, Baisers volés, Domicile conjugal, L'amour en fuite.

**Jacques de Imbelloni** · 10-31-2020, 01:09 AM

Tous les Matins du Monde

Tous les matins du monde (English translation: All the Mornings of the World) is a 1991 French film based on the book of the same name by Pascal Quignard.^[2] Set during the reign of Louis XIV, the film shows the eminent musician, Marin Marais, looking back on his young life when he was briefly a pupil of Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe,^[2] and features much music of the period, especially that for the viola da gamba.

Background

In the same year as the book's release, author Quignard, together with director Alain Corneau, adapted the novel for the film that starred Jean-Pierre Marielle, Gérard Depardieu, Anne Brochet and Guillaume Depardieu.
The film revolves around the late-17th/early-18th-century composer Marin Marais's life as a musician, his mentor Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe and Sainte-Colombe's daughters. The ageing Marais, played by Gérard Depardieu, narrates the story, while Depardieu's son Guillaume Depardieu plays the young Marais. The haunting sound of his instrument, the viol (viola da gamba), here played by Jordi Savall, is heard throughout the film and plays a major role in setting the mood. Though fictional, the story is based on historical characters, and what little is known about their lives is generally accurately portrayed.

Farinelli

Farinelli is a 1994 internationally co-produced biographical drama film directed by Gérard Corbiau and starring Stefano Dionisi, Enrico Lo Verso, Elsa Zylberstein and Jeroen Krabbé. It centers on the life and career of the 18th-century Italian opera singer Carlo Broschi, known as Farinelli, considered the greatest castrato singer of all time; as well as his relationship with his brother, composer Riccardo Broschi.

The 400 Blows

The 400 Blows (French: Les Quatre Cents Coups) is a 1959 French New Wave drama film, and the directorial debut of François Truffaut. The film, shot in DyaliScope, stars Jean-Pierre Léaud, Albert Rémy, and Claire Maurier. One of the defining films of the French New Wave,^[3] it displays many of the characteristic traits of the movement. Written by Truffaut and Marcel Moussy, the film is about Antoine Doinel, a misunderstood adolescent in Paris who struggles with his parents and teachers due to his rebellious behavior. Filmed on location in Paris and Honfleur, it is the first in a series of five films in which Léaud plays the semi-autobiographical character.
The 400 Blows received numerous awards and nominations, including the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Director, the OCIC Award, and a Palme d'Or nomination in 1959, and was also nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay in 1960. The film had 4.1 million admissions in France, making it Truffaut's most successful film in his home country.^[4]
The 400 Blows is widely considered one of the best French films in the history of cinema; in the 2012 Sight & Sound critics' poll of the greatest films ever made, it was ranked 39th.

Léon: The Professional

Léon: The Professional (French: Léon), titled Leon in the UK and Australia (and originally titled The Professional in the US), is a 1994 English-language French action-thriller film^[5]^[6]^[7]^[8] written and directed by Luc Besson. It stars Jean Reno, Gary Oldman, and Natalie Portman (in her film debut). The plot follows Léon (Reno), a professional hitman, who reluctantly takes in 12-year-old Mathilda (Portman), after her family is murdered by corrupted Drug Enforcement Administration agent Norman Stansfield (Oldman). Léon and Mathilda form an unusual relationship, as she becomes his protégée and learns the hitman's trade.