My Life With James Dean is one of those idiosyncratic French oddball comedies which are very much an acquired taste, which very, fortunately, we absolutely love. It’s the tale of a filmmaker Géraud Champreux (Johnny Rasse) who has been invited to a small Northern town by the local film curator to screen his latest indie film. … Continue reading
Céline Sciammawho has already given us Water Lillies, Tomboy, Girlhood and Being 17. confirms her position as one of the leading queer filmmakers with this her latest, and finest film to date. Portrait of A Lady on Fire is an historical drama set in the 19th Century that tells of a forbidden affair between … Continue reading
From French TV comes PROUD a powerful three part mini series that is a three-generation family drama about being gay in France from the 1980’s on. It’s how a committed Socialist working-class family had to cope with the reality that the outspoken liberal views of the father were severely challenged when he could not … Continue reading
It is impossible to overlook the influence of Federico Fellini’s 8½ in Antony Hickling’s Down in Paris, especially in the surreal bits of the film when reality and illusion collide to make way for a dazzling humane effect. A middle-aged film director wandering about in a glamourous city looking for inspiration and facing his … Continue reading
“Anais in Love” is a delightful new French rom-com, written and directed by a woman (Charline Bourgeois-Tacquet), which premiered at Cannes in 2021. The film does take a bit of patience. Not because its pace is slow (au contraire), but because its pace is fast. Anais (Anaïs Demoustier) is a 30-year-old who literally does … Continue reading