It’s one of the best times of year when the Alliance Française Film Festival rolls around, and it’s on soon, touring nationally from 3 March to 22 April.
Tickets are available now, but with 38 films, how do you choose?
I have a few strategies. With such great quality films, my first impulse is to close my eyes, point my finger at the screen and book that film! I do this for at least one film, to see something I wouldn’t normally see. Like trying on a new style of dress and then loving it. Otherwise, I go to films with my favourite directors or actors (Isabelle Huppert, anyone?!) and of course any genres that appeal.
Plus, there’s the extra excitement of seeing films on the big screen, where they’re best viewed, with like-minded people itching to see some crazy, wonderful, beautiful French films.
Instagram @affrenchfilmfestival:
At the Festival launch, we saw The Party’s Over! (Classe Moyenne), review below, but here’s a round-up of what else caught my eye.
Ozon
It wouldn’t be a French Film Festival without a François Ozon film. The Stranger (L’etranger), is Ozon’s vision of Albert Camus’ novel about an unassuming expat under trial for murder in French-colonised Algeria. What an unmissable mix – Ozon and Camus!
French stars
Impressive French stars such as Isabelle Huppert, Laure Calamy, Daniel Auteuil and Marion Cotillard are always worth watching. Huppert features in The Richest Woman in the World (La Femme la Plus Riche du Monde). (Note that Huppert will be in Australia in March for her solo stage performances of Mary Said What She Said at the Adelaide Festival.)
The film is based on the real-life scandal of Liliane Bettencourt, the billionaire heiress to the L’Oreal fortune, when she befriends Pierre-Alain Fantin, a dandy writer and photographer in Paris. Family and friends are not happy that her attention and money are focused on someone other than them.
Laure Calamy is in The Party’s Over! (Classe Moyenne ) andWhat is Love? (C’est Quoi L’amour?), Daniel Auteuil is in A Private Life (Vie Privée), and Oscar-winning Marion Cotillard stars in The Ice Tower (La Tour de Glace).
Cannes spotlight
From Cannes, The Great Arch (L’Inconnu de la Grande Arche). Billed as a dark comedy, the film tells the story of little-known Danish architect Otto von Spreckelsen, who unexpectedly won the competition to design the Great Arch of La Défense. His grand vision collides with practical constraints and political twists and turns.
Other Cannes picks include French coming-of-age drama Enzo and crime drama Case 137 (Dossier 137).
Hollywood stars
Hollywood stars and Oscar winners Jodie Foster and Angelina Jolie star in two dramas. Foster, who is fluent in French, stars in her first French-speaking role in A Private Life (Vie Privée) about a psychologist who believes her client has been murdered and starts her own investigation. It also stars the always amazing Daniel Auteuil as her ex-husband.
Jolie in Couture (Coutures) plays an American filmmaker commissioned to direct a film for a prestigious fashion house during Paris Fashion Week, who receives sudden news that destabilises her whole world.
A couple more films that jumped out
Based on a true story, 13 Days, 13 Nights (13 Jours, 13 Nuits) looks at France’s attempt to evacuate nationals and Afghan citizens from Kabul in August 2021. From heavy drama to comedic social commentary, Cycle of Time (C’était Mieux Demain), examines our fast-paced technological life through the lens of time travel.
FRENCH FILM REVIEW:
The Party’s Over! (Classe Moyenne)
The Party’s Over! takes off the gloves with this warts and all look at how both rich and poor wield their power through the story of two families – the caretakers, the Azizis, and their entitled employers, the Trousselards. Caught in the middle is the rich daughter’s boyfriend, a law graduate who comes from the same working-class background as the caretakers.
Set in the south of France, for years the Azizis have been looking after a beautiful holiday home for the Trousselards, who only spend the summer there. But the expectation is that the Azizis are available when needed, even one evening during their daughter’s birthday celebration.
Both families’ happy lives begin a downward spiral – the party is over – when rich father Philippe gives the Azizis’s daughter a new phone to apologise for taking her father away during her birthday dinner. Her father also gave her a phone, but could only afford a refurbished one, so his ego gets the better of him, and he storms up to the ‘big house’ yelling at the couple, criticising and telling them all their faults.
After an awkward apology that didn’t go down well, the Azizis decide to aggressively negotiate a huge termination settlement, as they have been employed off the books with less than minimum wage.
Despite the presence of the delightful Laure Calamy (Antoinette in the Cévennes, Call My Agent!) as one of the caretakers, no one is really likeable here, except perhaps the boyfriend, who genuinely wants to help both families and helps out with the negotiations. But things get to a head, and the ending is not neatly wrapped up in the way you might expect. This is both disappointing and refreshing!
A bientôt
Cynthia
Do you enjoy the AFFFF? Which films are you going to see?
Introducing Contributor Cynthia Karena
Immerse yourself in Cynthia’s articles on her Contributor page.