French Top Twenty

Across the channel now. I'd planned to do a top ten but so many belters would miss out if that were the format. So here are my favourite twenty French films. Again, ordering was extremely tough.

20. Buffet froid (Bertrand Blier - 1979)

Proper bonkers this is. Depardieu when he was a powerhouse, compared to just a house. I remember watching this with my face all screwed up, thinking "Can they even make films like this?" but loving it all the same.

19. Baxter (Jerome Boivin - 1989)

Another odd'un. Narrated by Baxter himself, a malevolent or maybe just dog-like bull terrier, this film follows his efforts to find a suitable home. Co-written by Jacques Audiard, who will appear later in this list.

18. Entre les murs [The Class] (Laurent Cantet - 2008)

A great slice of Parisian life, almost a documentary as it's based on the experiences of Francois Begaudeau, who wrote the novel, co-wrote the film AND bloody well starred in it and all! Won the Palme d'Or at Cannes. Agreed.

17. Coup de torchon (Betrand Tavernier - 1981)

A nihilistic, black comedy, melodrama from the sublime Betrand Tavernier. This plays a little like a farcical version of Graham Greene's, The Heart of the Matter. And that can only be good. I haven't seen it for a while but reckon I will again soon.

16. A bout portant [Point Blank] (Fred Cavaye - 2010)

I've talked about this on the blog before but I'll say it again. After a short set-up, this mutha does not stop. It's not a classic like some on this list, but it goes like the clappers. Great fun.

15. La regle du jeu [The Rules of the Game] (Jean Renoir - 1939)

One of Renoir's class critiques and a certified gem it is. A bit like an old, French Upstairs, Downstairs (though I don't remember that show, honestly). Pretty ground-breaking at its time as well from a master director.

14. De rouille et d'os [Rust and Bone] (Jacques Audiard - 2012)

SPOILER AHEAD!!!!

Cotillard directed by Audiard. They need to work together again. This is probably the sexiest film about bare-knuckle boxing and amputation that I've ever seen. A slightly soapy ending doesn't subtract much either. That face. Blimey.

13. Delicatessen (Marc Caro & Jean-Pierre Jeunet - 1991)

Modern classic. Pure surreal brilliance (but still not Caro & Jeunet's best - see down the list). The chain reaction scene where Louison fixes a bed (left) is top drawer.

Life regret: not buying one of those cow or sheep noise tins at the Lumiere cinema when this was screened.

12. Cache [Hidden] (Michael Haneke - 2005)

I wasn't sure what to expect with this but it blew me away when I saw it at the cinema. A slowly-paced build up with a short, sharp smack, followed by more creep. It's like a visual Pixies song in French. Juliette Binoche and Daniel Auteuil have rarely, if ever, been better.

11. De battre mon couer s'est arrete [The Beat That My Heart Skipped] (Jacques Audiard - 2005)

Another Audiard. You might be thinking he's my favourite director. You'd be right. This film gets it all spot on. An odd central character played by the coolest bastard in film today, Romain Duris. A seemingly simple story of frustration and revenge, with added piano music. And Melanie Laurent pops up, too briefly. Excellent.

10. Le salaire de la peur [The Wages of Fear] (Henri-Georges Clouzot - 1959)

A fantastically tense drama/thriller set in Central America where a few desperate blokes have to transport explosives across the country. In one sequence, they have to maintain a quick speed over a stretch of corrugated road. If they slow down, they blow up. I almost stopped breathing. And then I shat myself. Literally or metaphorically - you decide.

9. La haine (Mathieu Kassovitz- 1995)

Watching this at the cinema in 1995, I remember thinking everything was going to be OK with film; as an art form, as a social commentator, as something to be respected, for many years to come.

WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED!?!?!

8. La grande illusion [The Grand Illusion] (Jean Renoir - 1937)

Another of Renoir's classics. An even-handed and dignified story about class barriers during WW1. Sounds a bit earnest and dry but this is a stone cold corker. Jean Gabin needs some serious re-discovering,

7. The Vertical Ray of the Sun (Tran Ahn Hung - 2000)

I'll say it again. This is a beautiful film. I could watch the scenes of the brother and sister waking up (left) all day long. Among many others. Great soundtrack too.

6. Olivier, Olivier (Agnieszka Holland - 1992)

Sad, wonderful film about loss and hope. 9 year old Olivier disappears one day only to turn up six years later. But is it him? Cracking story teeming with great performances, including one from Francois Cluzet, who also appears next on this list....

5. Ne le dis a personne [Tell No One] (Guillaume Canet - 2006)

As gripping as any film I've seen, with some inspired editing and intense acting. The set-up alone must have green-lit the film in a hot second. Excellent thriller.

4. Un prophete [A Prophet] (Jacques Audiard - 2009)

The best Audiard (so far) sees the rise of a young prisoner to power and influence. A Prophet works as so many different films - prison drama, action, mystery, gritty realism, even Christ allegory. Take it how you will but certainly take it. You won't be disappointed.

3. Trois couleurs: Blanc [Three Colours: White] (Krzysztof Kieslowski - 1993)

The Three Colours Trilogy is brilliant and, for me, this middle third is the best. Bone dry, black comedy with a strangely easy to identify with loser (Zamachowski, left) at it's core. Julie Delpy ices it too.

2. La cite des enfants perdus [The City of Lost Children] (Marc Caro & Jean-Pierre Jeunet - 1995)

Just magic. One of the real tragedies of cinema is that Judith Vittet (left) basically retired from acting after this. In my mind, the best performance by a kid in a film. Hands down. And the rest of the film takes her lead. A fantastically rendered, sweet, bizarre dream of a film. Nearly number one for my money.....

1. A bout de souffle [Breathless] (Jean-Luc Godard - 1960)

....but it's very hard to top this super-cool debut from Godard. I've kept this as my favourite French film because it was probably one of the reasons I got so nerdily into film. Looking at it now, I can see it flirts heavily with pretentious toffle but I still get a little tingle thinking about it's style and originality.

Comments

Lee

Biopics are tough to get right. For every Lawrence of Arabia , there's a Diana , for every Raging Bull , there's an Ali . The film Lee shines some natural light of the life of renowned war photographer Lee Miller, played by Kate Winslet. She gives it full welly in this - physically and emotionally nude, with camouflage painted boobs, close-ups with no make-up, moles, wrinkles, rage and tears. It's very much the kind of 'brave' performance that the Academy loves to reward. The film starts with Miller crustily answering questions to a young man in 1977, and as she remembers things from her past, we head to flashback territory. It seems a fairly cack-handed framing device until we realise why it's happening. A modicum of research reveals that the film is a pretty accurate retelling of Miller's life - first her carefree bohemian days in pre-WW2 France (including her intro to future hubby, Roland Penrose, played by Alexander Skarsgård), then how she started with

There's Still Tomorrow

This is a very strange film - is it a domestic violence comedy? A neo-realist fantasy? A kitchen-sink musical? All of these sound wrong but director (and star), Paola Cortellesi manages to combine the disparate elements into a unique concoction. Set in post-war Rome, the film opens with Delia (Cortellesi) saying good morning in bed to her husband, Ivano (Valerio Mastandrea), only to receive a hefty backhander. Her reaction tells us this is not an unusual occurrence in her life, as the rest of the family are introduced - a couple of shit-headed boys, a grown-up daughter, and an irascible father-in-law. Cue a glorious slow-motion credit sequence of Delia walking along her local street, getting on with the day's duties. The accompanying musical track is pretty incongruous, another oddity in this head-scratcher of a film (though not as surprising as when an Outkast song bursts in). The story revels in the time and place, and the black and white cinematography, by Davide Leone, is exqui

Sand Land (Me) (Kids)

Popped down to Palace cinema in the city for a packed screening of Sand Land , part of the Japanese Film Festival Australia . Created by Akira Toriyama (of Dragon Ball fame), this started as a manga book series in 2000. It seems this film was made slightly before, or at the same time as a TV series covering similar ground. That ground being a Mad Max style wasteland where the water supply is controlled and sold by a rotund King (Chafûrin). An old, local sherriff, Rao (Kazuhiro Yamaji), suspects there's a source of water in the desert a few days drive away and so decides to investigate. Knowing he'll need help, he approaches the gang of demons who live nearby. The demons chosen to accompany Rao are the keen Beelzebub (Mutsumi Tamura) and the less enthused Thief (Chô). The trio head off but are soon beset by issues, including enormous sand snakes, marauding punks and the King's military units. As their vehicles tyres were punctured by said punks, Rao commandeers a tank, set

A Different Man

The idea of having a doppelganger replace us has been around for ages, at least since Dostoevsky wrote his famous novel, The Double , possibly even earlier. Great films like The Machinist , Fight Club , Enemy , Stranger Than Fiction and Infernal Affairs have all taken inspiration from the source. It's hard, though, to imagine it being done with more verve and ridiculousness than in Aaron Schimberg's A Different Man . This film is a treat. It stars Sebastian Stan as Edward, who has a form of neurofibromatosis (a condition that affects the nervous system), which causes his face to swell up in lumpy tumours. Early on, he meets a new neighbour, Ingrid (Renate Reinsve), and they become close friends, bonding over their shared passion for the theatre - he's a struggling actor, she's a hopeful playwright. Partially due to this new relationship (and maybe the hope of furthering it), partly due to fatigue at his 'abnormal' life, Edward decides to try an experimental n

Gladiator II

There's a lot to enjoy in this sequel to Sir Ridders' original from 2000. The film picks up about 16 years after the end of the first one, where we find Rome ruled by a pair of foppish twats, Geta (Joseph Quinn) and Caracalla (Fred Hechinger). Tasked to expand the empire, General Acacias (Pedro Pascal) leads an attack on Numidia in North Africa, coming up against Paul Mescal's Verus. Once this speccy set piece is over, now-widower Verus finds himself on route to the fighting stadia, where he catches the eye of Macrinus (Denzel Washington), a kind of antiquity Don King. Verus is driven by rage, hungry for revenge on those who killed his wife, but there seems to be more to his story. And those familiar with the original (or anyone who's read anything online about this film) will probably know what, but I'm not about to drop the cat bag. It's beautifully shot by lenser supremo, John Mathieson, especially one silvery sequence near the start where Deaths arrive on a

He Ain't Heavy

He Ain't Heavy is the debut feature from Perth writer/director, David Vincent Smith. It's a very prosaic look at addiction and what it can do to the family unit. In this case, the addicted person is Max, played by Sam Corlett. His mum, Bev, is played by Aussie/Italian/British (in that order) screen legend, Greta Scacchi. But the lead, and heart of the film, is Jade, a fantastic Leila George. She's the strung-out, desperate sister of Max, who hits upon a slightly controversial way of trying to get her brother clean. The confronting opening scene sets up the rest of the film - Jade arrives at a house where a ruckus is occurring, namely Max trying to violently force his way into his mum's house. Eventually, he succeeds and buggers off in Bev's car, only to smash it a few metres down the road. Max scarpers quick smart, mum collapses and is briefly taken to hospital. Jade is at the end of her tether and the chance to clear out her recently passed away Grandma's hous

We Were Children

We Were Children (or Eravamo Bambini ) is a Calabrian-set drama/thriller about childhood trauma and regrets. A group of thirty-somethings return to the small seaside town of their youth to confront a situation that has affected their lives since the moment it happened twenty years before. The film begins with a police patrol coming across a suspicious bloke in the bushes beside a villa one night. He threatens them with a huge hunting knife and is summarily arrested and taken in for questioning. The story unfurls from here, with detained postie Antonio (Francesco Russo) giving the police some details, and flashbacks helping us with others. These past scenes show a group of friends going through regular teenage issues. Margherita and Gianluca are a sweetly fumbling couple, though Walter might be a spoke in their wheel. Andrea is Margherita's irritating younger brother, and Peppino is the local senator's boy. The sun-tinged Calabrian past is juxtaposed with the more aggressively

Merchant Ivory

Here's the first of a few films I'm planning to catch at the British Film Festival so I'll attempt to keep the reviews relatively brief. This a documentary directed by Stephen Soucy about the legendary filmmaking team, Merchant Ivory Productions. The formidable ensemble consisted of producer Ismail Merchant, director James Ivory, writer Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, and composer Richard Robbins. After meeting in 1961, Ivory and Merchant started a fruitful partnership, both professionally and romantically. The film shows us their somewhat ramshackle early films, made in India, moving on to marginally more assured productions in the US, and finally to the English period dramas they became known for in the 80s and onwards. Together, they made over 40 films, some absolute gems among them. A Room with a View , Howard's End , and The Remains of the Day are probably their best, though you could throw in Heat and Dust , Maurice , and The Golden Bowl as very strong examples of their

Joker: Folie à Deux

Trepidation was the key feeling going into this screening of Todd Phillips' sequel to his 2019 hit Joker . After a kooky animated opening (made by French animator, Sylvain Chomet), the film begins with Arthur Fleck in Arkham Asylum, waiting for a decision on whether he's fit for trial or not. The events of the first film aren't too far back and a lot of this edition covers the court case - a neat way to bring us up to speed, but also a huge part of this film's issues. You see, I think this whole film is a 'mea culpa' for the first Joker . The court scenes build up to an expected crescendo of action, or at the very least some sort of vindication for Arthur/Joker. But the actual climax is a damp squib, followed by a dramatically undeserved denouement. The whole final third felt like a cop-out. Did Phillips take note of some of the criticism of Joker and plan a filmic apology for all the 'nihilism'? Or had he always planned this kind of absolution? I gues

Timestalker

Here's an odd little number about reincarnation and love across the ages, or more to the point, dawning self-determination. Alice Lowe writes, directs and stars as Agnes, a woman besotted with Aneurin Barnard's Alex. Always. In many different time periods. We kick off in 1688, where Alex is about to be executed before Agnes steps (trips) in, and saves him. We zip forward to 1793, Alice this time bored of her pampered lifestyle in a manor house with pets, wigs and servants. Oh, and a disgustingly oafish Nick Frost for a hubby, George. But who's the stalker in time? Is it Agnes? She's the clear favourite. Or the object of her desires, Alex, who for the most part, isn't too keen on reciprocating? Is it the boorish George, who does physically stalk in one of the episodes. It may even refer to the peripheral figures of servant, friend & potential lover, Meg (Tanya Reynolds) or wily Scipio (Jacob Anderson - Grey Worm from Game of Thrones ). To be fair, it's hintin

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