Jacques Baratier

Quote:
La Ville bidon describes precisely the historical path, in the parisian suburbs of the seventies, from slum cities (“bidonvilles”) to silly/fake cities (“villes bidon”). The film switch es constantly from a very documentary approach to a fictional delirium in a critical way that is tending to show how crazy the documentary parts are themselves, this is to say the reality itself ! For example, those realistic moments invite us through the process of decision taking : we see the different point of view of the architect, the politic leader, the real estate developer, the sociologist, each of them is quite mad and typical of a particular time. But they also invite us in the slum cities and in the “transitory buildings” where several communities were difficultly living together (the children characters of this film could be the parents of those who are even more desperate and loose and rejected today in all the french big cities suburbs). Read More »

Autour de Jacques Baratier & Sweet and Sour
By Elliott Stein – Tuesday, April 14th 2009 – Village Voice

(Jacques Baratier, 1963). This fascinating nearly plot-less feature from eccentric Baratier, a director hardly known in America, is a quirky riff on cinema verite, with guest appearances from a dazzling array of European luminaries from the 60s including Simone Signoret, Jean-Paul Belmondo, Monica Vitti, and Roger Vadim. It was shot by the great Henri Decae, cinematographer of The Four Hundred Blows, Plein Soleil and La Ronde.Read More »

Quote:
While there is an element of science fiction to this political satire about Latin American dictatorships, that element is primarily used to promote the storyline and the message, and not as a value in itself. In a make-believe Spanish-speaking country of the Americas, a dictator (Zbigniew Cybulski) rules with the usual degree of corruption but as it turns out, his wife is the one who gives most of the orders. Two story strands are then woven together: a scientist has invented a way to replicate objects and, lo and behold, he discovers he can make a robotic duplicate of the dictator’s wife. Meanwhile, an ardent, left-leaning revolutionary who happens to be a dead ringer for the dictator ends up taking over the tyrant’s role when he is assassinated. So one has a robotic wife and a fake dictator now running a country which is none the wiser…Read More »

synopsis
As far as can be determined, Goha was Tunisia’s first entry in the Cannes Film Festival. Omar Sharif stars as a naïve young man who is taken for granted by friends and family. Little do they know that he has more intelligence, tenacity and imagination than all of them put together. The story takes an unexpectedly dramatic turn when the man falls in love with the young wife of his village’s elderly “wise man”. Based on an ancient Tunisian folk tale, Goha boasts impressive production values and sure-handed direction (by Jacques Baratier).Read More »