AFTER 10 SERIES
Every night, from Tuesday, April 19 to Saturday, April 23, explore new horizons with an exclusive program of French productions scheduled after 10 pm. All films are screened in the Truffaut Theater.
(Please note: After 10 schedule is not compatible with screenings in RENOIR theater at 8:30 pm. Buy or reserve tickets accordingly)
Tuesday, April 19 – 10:20 pm – Truffaut Theater
THE FIRST, THE LAST (Les Premiers, les derniers)
Dark comedy, western, drama • North American Premiere
Elements of the western and the gothic thriller come together in this darkly absurd conceptual one-off. Set amidst the industrial ruins of a flatland vast enough to swallow men whole, Cochise (Albert Dupontel) and Gilou (Bouli Lanners), a pair of grizzled bounty hunters, have been hired by a wealthy stranger to obtain a phone that holds some critical information. The phone is in the possession of Esther and Willy, a homeless young couple. Whenever they turn the phone on, Cochise and Gilou can get a lead on their whereabouts, but the feckless lovers don’t have much need for phones. They believe the end-times have begun, an unlikely proposition seemingly corroborated by the appearance of a gaunt, bearded man calling himself Jesus. As the chase develops, straightforward genre elements give way to more metaphorical and thematic concerns. In this singular and deeply personal universe, everyone, including a craggy undertaker played by Max Von Sydow, seems uprooted, set adrift in his/her own way. Written and directed by Bouli Lanners.
Wednesday, April 20 – 10:30 pm – Truffaut Theater
EVA DOESN’T SLEEP (Eva ne dort pas)
Drama • Los Angeles Premiere • World Cinema Produced by France series.
Part hagiography, part ghost story, this visionary drama featuring Gael García Bernal and Denis Lavant chronicles the epic 25 year journey of a corpse. Not just any corpse, mind you, but that of the beloved champion of working-class Argentines, Eva Perón, whose tragic death at the age of 33 prompted a spectacle of public grief that lasted for weeks. Fetishized in death, the bizarre-but-true fate of Perón’s cadaver becomes a metaphor for a nation haunted by a broken dream of social justice and unity. Told in elliptical chapters, we meet the official state embalmer whose task to prepare his “masterpiece” for permanent public display leads to some rather unnervingly intimate situations. Then there’s a pair of soldiers whose mission to smuggle the “Sleeping Beauty” out of the country gets sidetracked by certain, less respectful preoccupations. Like a piece of stolen art, her mystique grows, until the new military junta decides to put a dead person at the top of the list of people to be permanently disappeared. Written and directed by Pablo Agüero.
Thursday, April 21 – 10:20 pm – Truffaut Theater
SAINT AMOUR
Comedy, drama • North American Premiere
Deadpan humor hits the highway for a romp through France’s most beautiful wine-growing regions, finding pathos - and some highly improbable sex - along the way. Benoît Poelvoorde brings his signature staccato to the role of Bruno (Benoît Poelvoorde), a lonely, patched-together, wannabe-anything-but cattle farmer. Bruno hopes to drink his way through his personal crisis by taking the “national wine tour”, a series of regional wine stalls at Paris’ annual agriculture trade fair. When Bruno’s buzz turns belligerent, his father Jean (Gérard Depardieu) decides that a tour of the real wine country is just the thing to help his son better appreciate France’s rural traditions. On the spot, Jean hires a cabbie, the handsome but smug city slicker Mike, and the unlikely trio hoof it out to the countryside to squeeze in a little drinking between hilariously awkward hookups and offbeat encounters, including one with author Michel Houellebecq as a disturbing B&B proprietor. Gérard Depardieu brings some heft to the proceedings as the genial, but slightly befuddled dad hoping to reconnect with his wayward son. Written and directed by Benoît Delépine and Gustave Kervern
Friday, April 22 – 10:00 pm – Truffaut Theater
FAST CONVOY (Le Convoi)
Action, thriller • North American Premiere • Film Noir Series
Speed isn’t the only thing that kills in this slick, turbo-charged road thriller. Benoît Magimel leads a band of banlieue bad boys hauling stash for cash while steering clear of the law. Tasked with moving 3,000 lbs. of hashish from southern Spain to Paris, Alex (Magimel) organizes a motorcade of four vehicles for a “go fast” – a flagrant, high-speed drug run designed to be so risky the police can’t stop the traffickers without endangering the public. The scout car looks for trouble up the road, while Alex stoically drives the follow car, ready to intervene should trouble be found. The team's camaraderie is fragile, and as they tick off the kilometers, suspicion and paranoia make everyone twitchy. The tension kicks into overdrive when a firefight with the Spanish police forces them to take a hostage. Burning as much adrenaline as gasoline, Alex struggles to hold the team together as they make their mad dash for pay dirt in Paris. Co-written and directed by Frédéric Schoendoerffer.
Saturday, April 23 – 10:15 pm- Truffaut Theater
BANG GANG (A Modern Love Story)
Drama • West Coast Premiere • French NeWave 2.0 Series • >17
A heat wave isn’t the only thing in full swing in this steamy drama about rich kids in the coastal town of Biarritz stripping down and shaking off that mid-summer ennui. As Young George, Marilyn Lima (think adolescent Bardot painted by Botticelli), unexpectedly falls for Alex after he coaxes her into a casual encounter. When the feelings aren’t reciprocated, George tries to remind him what he’s missing by instigating a game of truth or dare with enough dare in it to put a glint in the eye of a porn impresario. Aided by some selfies and the Internet, word spreads, and what began as an attempt to spark a little jealously explodes into a furious wildfire of sexual discovery. George, Alex, and their growing circle of libertine teens are now determined to find their limits, consequences be damned. Written and directed by Eva Husson.
