Classic’s movies

OFFICIAL SELECTION IN CANNES 1983 – CANNES CLASSIC
César Awards, France, 1984 WINNER: César Best Actress, Best Editing, Best Supporting Actress, Best Writing – Adaptation
When She arrives in a small French town in her tiny summer skirt and high-heeled shoes, She sets the entire male population afire. Pin Pon falls in love and marries her, never suspecting that her sexy walk is all part of an incredible revenge.

Italy in the 1930’s. A young anarchist “Tunino” (a role which won Giancarlo Giannini top acting award in Cannes) is sent to assassinate Mussolini. Tunino’s contact in Rome is a lively flapper who arranges for the young man to stay at a brothel while preparing the assassination. However, a few days in the company of lovely young prostitutes can be very distracting and love and politics do not always mix well…

Mimí, forced to leave his family in Sicily, finds a job in a factory in Turin, where he gets involved in an extramarital affair.

Marcel Camus directs this gentle portrait of mild-mannered Léon (Bourvil), an innkeeper in Normandy who manages to stay clear of any political activity during the German Occupation until a British aviator shows up at his inn. Léon’s daughter falls in love with the British pilot and, just to complicate things, Léon finds himself caught up in a plot to assassinate Rommel !

Jean-Paul and Marianne spend lazy holidays at their villa in idyllic Southern France. However when Harry and his attrac tive young daughter Penelope show up, the dreamy summer days are suddenly filled with unspoken tension and jealousy.

Pier Paolo Pasolini electrifies the myth of Medea (seduced and betrayed by Jason, she takes drastic measures to extract her revenge) with a mixture of ritual theatre and social anthropology. Maria Callas is riveting in the title role, giving a profoundly expressive performance as the deranged sorceress. Under Pasolini’s direction, the plight of colonised cultures is symbolised by Medea as she surrenders to the foreign intruder, betrays the secrets of her people and, in doing so, is driven to madness and murder.

Hernandez, commander of the garrison in a small village, joins a group of townsmen with the intention of robbing orphan Manuel of his inheritance. Luke, suffering from a traumatic past and now an alcoholic, is chosen by revolutionary Pancho to be the pawn of the conspirators.

After some serious tinkering, modest inventor Jules Duroc (Bourvil) creates the first modern bicycle. Before Duroc can demonstrate his invention, he is forced to flee a relentless debt collector. The clever inventor hides out among the participants in the Paris-San Remo race – which he ends up winning thanks to his marvellous new bicycle.

Two adventurers and best friends, Roland and Manu, are the victims of a practical joke that costs Manu his pilot’s license. With seeming contrition, the jokesters tell Roland and Manu about a crashed plane lying on the ocean floor off the coast of Congo stuffed with riches. The adventurers set off to find the loot. Going with them is Laetitia, an artistic young woman who treats them like brothers, plays along with their schemes, makes sculptures of found objects, and dreams of buying an old fort on the French coast. The Congo tip turns out to be a trap and the adventurers must pick up the pieces.

Ten-year-old Alain lives with his mother in the working class neighbourhood of Belleville- Ménilmontant on Rue des Cascades in Paris. When his mother’s young, black lover, Vincent, comes to live with them, Alain is overcome with jealousy and racist feelings. But Vincent warmly treats Alain as he would his own son, taking him around the city, playing with him and disarming every prejudice the boy harbours.

Paul fishes out of the water the body of his greatest enemy. To avoid accusations that he is a killer, taking steps that will clear his good name.

A pimp with no other means to provide for himself finds his life spiraling out of control when his prostitute is sent to prison.

A beautiful 18-year-old orphan escapes from a reformatory and hooks up wth a gang of jewel smugglers, and decides on a life of crime. However, she falls for and marries a policeman, putting a crimp in her criminal career.

Once again Jean Cocteau updates a classic to a compelling modern allegory. Jean Marais is Orpheus, a poet in search of inspiration. Marie Déa is radiant as Eurydice. Maria Casarès is Death, the imperious and seductive princess, whose glove-clad hand ripples though a mirror, leading Orpheus to another world…

A French fugitive arrives in Genoa, where he becomes entangled with an Italian woman and her daughter.

Jean Cocteau adapts Victor Hugos’s great romantic drama for the screen and asks Pierre Billon to direct. Jean Marais stars in a double role, both as Ruy Blas, the poor young student deeply in love with the Queen of Spain (the radiant Danielle Darrieux) and the man he strangely resembles, Don Cesare de Bazin. Because of this uncanny physical similarity, the unscrupulous chief of police, Don Sallustre (Marcel Herrand), engages Ruy Blas in order to manipulate the Queen. But the evil Don Sallustre underestimates Ruy Blas’ loyalty to his Monarch…

CANNES CLASSICS 2013, LOUIS-DULLUC PRIZE
Once upon a time there was a very beautiful girl whose father picked a rose in the Beast’s garden. In order to save her father’s life she decides to pay a visit to the Beast. At first she is repelled by its ugliness, but then her feelings change and she begins to feel sorry for the Beast. Overwhelmed by the young girl’s charm and outstanding beauty the Beast turns itself into Prince Charming…

In order to escape from the police, a young burglar flees to the south of France, where he finds work in a quarry. He meets a nice, young girl, the sister of one of his colleagues, but decides not to drop his lover. This one wants him to commit another crime, after which he is caught and send to prison. After his liberation, the colleague’s sister waits for him.

The creaking wheels of the phantom carriage ridden by Death himself – and driven for a year by the hapless man who dies at the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Eve – provide the sinister backdrop for this rare French fantasy film. Pierre Fresnay is remarkable as hard-drinking tough guy, David, whose buddy Georges (the equally remarkable Louis Jouvet) haunts his nights as the ghostly carriage driver. A woman from the Salvation Army will try to save David from the fate of his friend…

Canadian Iass Maria Chapdelaine (Madeleine Renaud) is torn between two suitors, an aristocrat (Jean-Pierre Aumont) and a rugged lumberjack (Jean Gabin) in a beautifully shot 19th Century romantic triangle.

Max (Jean Gabin), an aging gangster, and his cellmate, Pierre (Jean-Claude Brialy) escape from prison. They board an airplane for Rome where Max has stashed a huge amount of gold and disguise themselves as clergymen in order to blend in with the wave of priests heading for the Vatican during the Holy Year. Things become quite complicated for the fake bishop and his friend when their plane is hijacked and heads not for Rome but Tangiers!