France

  • Lionel Soukaz – Le sexe des anges (1977)

    1971-1980EroticaExperimentalFranceLionel SoukazQueer Cinema(s)

    Quote:
    Lionel Soukaz (1953, Paris, France) at age 20 started making underground short films in Super 8, dealing with homosexuality in line with the Parisian FHAR (Front Homosexuel d’Action Revolutionnaire; Homosexual Front for Revolutionary Action), pornography (Ixe) and social criticism (I Live in a Bush World). He worked as an organizer of many gay film festivals such as the Film Festival of La Rochelle in 1977, and the Fortnight of Homosexual Cinema in 1978 in Paris. This last one was interrupted by the Ministry of Culture when Soukaz was arrested. He made Race D’ep, un siècle d’images de l’homosexualité with Guy Hocquenghem in 1979. Since then, he has pursuited a discreet career as a video filmmaker.Read More »

  • Guy Debord – The Society of the spectacle AKA La Société du spectacle (1973)

    1971-1980FranceGuy DebordPhilosophyPoliticsThe Films of May '68

    This film by Guy E. Debord is based on his 1967 book of the same title both of which convey ideas about the consumer capitalism’s mode of production and the effects on everyday life. Though both sources use a different means of communication they both powerfully convey the ideas of the situationists. I wont rant on about the ideas contain within this film which are quite profound and have influenced heavily on the Anti-Capitalist movement and post-structuralism through thinkers like Jean Baudrillard. The structure of the film itself is a series of shots from Hollywood films to soviet “collective hero” film experiments to soft-core porn(nothing past topless) to archival footage of historical events(e.g. May 68 revolt in France) and representations of everyday life. Read More »

  • Marin Karmitz – Coup pour coup AKA Blow for Blow (1972)

    1971-1980DramaFranceMarin KarmitzThe Films of May '68

    Synopsis by Clarke Fountain
    Coup Pour Coup is a film about a worker’s strike at a textile plant, and is written and enacted by the actual striking workers. This film was a collaborative and collective effort. Videotapes of upcoming scenes were discussed by the workers, and camera angles as well as dramatic refinements were agreed on before any film was exposed. Given that the film presents the worker’s point of view and is a largely amateur effort, reviewers found it surprisingly effective as a dramatic piece. One interesting feature of the film, and of the strike itself, is that it was organized and led by women. While there had been male union leaders, they were bypassed or ousted for their lack of leadership, understanding, or negotiating skills.Read More »

  • Jean Eustache – La maman et la putain (1973)

    1971-1980ArthouseDramaFranceJean EustacheThe Films of May '68

    A few days of a dandyish French intellectual in his late 20s named Alexandre (Jean-Pierre Leaud), who’s living with and supported by his lover, Marie (Bernadette Lafont); she’s in her mid-30s and runs a small boutique. In the first scene he borrows a neighbor’s car and tracks down a former girlfriend, Gilberte (Isabelle Weingarten), who’s just started a new semester at the Sorbonne, and tries to persuade her to marry him, only to discover that she’s just agreed to marry someone else. (We and Alexandre briefly glimpse Gilberte with her husband, played by Eustache, toward the end of the film, in the liquor section of a department store.) After hanging out with an equally idle friend (Jacques Renard) at the Deux Magots cafe, Alexandre follows a young woman after she leaves a nearby table, asks for her phone number, and scores; the remainder of the film is devoted to his courting of her.Read More »

  • Jean-Luc Magneron – Mai 68, la belle ouvrage (1969)

    Documentary1961-1970FranceJean-Luc MagneronPoliticsThe Films of May '68

    Quote:
    Mostly talking heads interviewed about the state violence they witnessed or endured during the month of May and June 68 in Paris. Nurses, students in medicine or else, passers-by, journalists, a psychiatrist, etc…Read More »

  • Denis Héroux – Valérie (1969)

    1961-1970ArthouseDenis HérouxEroticaFrance

    Synopsis
    A seminal Quebec erotic film about a curious girl who leaves her convent to explore the Montréal hippy scene, becomes a prostitute and meets her true love who doesn’t know she’s a hooker, that started erotic film genre in Canada.Read More »

  • Axelle Ropert – La famille Wolberg AKA The Wolberg Family (2009)

    2001-2010Axelle RopertComedyDramaFrance

    Synopsis
    He can knock out an amazing speech on the American soul to dumbfounded schoolchildren, meddle in his fellow citizens’ lives, or make his 18-year-old daughter swear that never would she leave the family home. This is Simon Wolberg, mayor of a small provincial town, madly in love with his wife, an overwhelming father and provocative son! This man bears his family’s obsession, which drives him to put these ties to the test, verify their strength and fragility…Read More »

  • Claire Simon – Le bois dont les rêves sont faits AKA The Woods Dreams Are Made of (2015)

    2011-2020ArthouseClaire SimonDocumentaryFrance

    The Woods is a deep investigation of both people and place. Whether it’s Gay men crossings for sex in the rain, out a hermit who makes his home deep in a remote section of the park, everywhere humans are busily going about their businessRead More »

  • Chantal Akerman – Là-bas aka Down there (2006)

    2001-2010ArthouseChantal AkermanFranceVideo Art

    Devastating essay on exile, Là-bas (2006) is a crucial moment of Akerman’s life when she herself was confined to a rental apartment in Tel Aviv unable to bridge the threshold to the outside world, overwhelmed by the flooding of traumatic thoughts, fears and vulnerabilities awakened by her family’s history with the death camps. Impossible not to think of her last work and of the reasons why she left when watching Là-bas today, which was also shot in video and similarly takes the shape of a personal, cloistered chamber piece.
    (Based on Andréa Picard’s article)Read More »

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