The Notebook Primer introduces readers to some of the most important figures, films, genres, and movements in film history.It’s not always necessary to know a filmmaker’s biography in order to fully appreciate his or her work, but in the case of François Truffaut, it is not only beneficial, it may also be unavoidable. Few directors have so ardently worn their lives on their cinematic sleeve as Truffaut, persistently projecting his passions on the screen for all to see. Born February 6, 1932, he was a child of World War II, but only later in his career was that great tragedy the subject of conspicuous focus. Rather, his recurring concerns were of a more personal nature, ranging and reappearing throughout his work in the form of fleeting flirtations and complex affairs, the multifaceted unrest of childhood, and, of course, the cinema itself. As a wayward young man, Truffaut found refuge...
- 2/2/2022
- MUBI
Éric Rohmer was notoriously secretive about his personal life, giving alternate birth names, birth cities, and birth dates. But according to biographers Antoine de Baecque and Noël Herpe, Rohmer was actually born Maurice Joseph Henri Schérer, in Tulle, on March 21, 1920. Whatever the truth, such resolute devotion to privacy reflected the exclusive and rigorous nature of Rohmer’s working life as well. Often going against the grain of his early French New Wave contemporaries, and from there enjoying a similar autonomy and singularity within the sphere of international cinema, Rohmer directed distinctive films most aligned—emphatically and productively—with his own filmography. Maintaining a remarkable dedication to consistent themes, dramatic interests, and, in nearly all cases, a comparable formal approach, Rohmer placed the nuanced behavior of the individual at the fore of all his work. Above: Le Signe du lionSteeped in studies of history, literature, and philosophy, Rohmer arrived at his burgeoning cinephile comparatively late.
- 11/5/2020
- MUBI
Les Cahiers du Cinema, the iconic publication that was a driving force behind the French New Wave, is weathering an unprecedented crisis following the resignation of the majority of its staff on Thursday.
Some of its journalists, however, have decided to remain on board while they await the appointment of a new editor-in-chief.
Among the seasoned candidates rumored to be in the running to take over as editor-in-chief are film critic-director Marcos Uzal; film and theater critic and historian Antoine de Baecque; Charles Tesson, the current artistic director of Cannes Critics Week, who previously held the position at Les Cahiers du Cinema from 1998 to 2003; and Jean-Marc Lalanne, a film critic who runs the culture magazine Les Inrocks.
Although it was reported that the entire newsroom of Les Cahiers du Cinema has quit in protest against the publication’s new owners — which include billionaire businessman Xavier Niel; Alain Weill, the head...
Some of its journalists, however, have decided to remain on board while they await the appointment of a new editor-in-chief.
Among the seasoned candidates rumored to be in the running to take over as editor-in-chief are film critic-director Marcos Uzal; film and theater critic and historian Antoine de Baecque; Charles Tesson, the current artistic director of Cannes Critics Week, who previously held the position at Les Cahiers du Cinema from 1998 to 2003; and Jean-Marc Lalanne, a film critic who runs the culture magazine Les Inrocks.
Although it was reported that the entire newsroom of Les Cahiers du Cinema has quit in protest against the publication’s new owners — which include billionaire businessman Xavier Niel; Alain Weill, the head...
- 2/28/2020
- by Elsa Keslassy
- Variety Film + TV
Aux quatre coinsOrigins in art are forever in doubt. Popular culture seems to imagine that what we now call the French New Wave emerged from thin air with François Truffaut's The 400 Blows (1959) and Jean-Luc Godard's Breathless (1960), but that blinkered narrative ignores features ranging from Agnès Varda’s Le pointe courte (1955) and Claude Chabrol’s Le beau Serge (1958) to Alain Resnais and Marguerite Duras’s Hiroshima, mon amour (1959). Even before these, the filmmakers we associate—through later fame, scandal, obscurity, venerability, and legend—with the New Wave made short films, a medium encouraged by the theatrical practice, now long gone in France, of regularly exhibiting dramatic and documentary short films in cinemas. Early shorts by Jacques Demy, Chris Marker, Truffaut, Godard, and others reach back into the mid-50s, but only two of the New Wave’s anointed truly began their filmmaking at the halfway point of the 20th century: Eric Rohmer,...
- 10/17/2016
- MUBI
Mubi is showing Eric Rohmer's The Marquise of O (1976) in the United States from August 27 - September 26, 2016. A pronouncement—a mysterious pregnancy and an offer of marriage. Incredulity and laughter. “Suddenly, the war—.”Wry distance followed by a jarring plunge into chaos—so opens The Marquise of O, Éric Rohmer’s remarkable (and remarkably faithful) adaptation of the 1808 novella by Heinreich von Kleist. Set in Italy during the Napoleonic Wars, the story begins with the assault of a castle inhabited by a colonel and his family. During the attack, the colonel’s widowed daughter, Julietta (Edith Clever), is set upon by invading Russian soldiers, but is rescued by Count F (Bruno Ganz), a Russian officer. After the castle has been surrendered, the Count visits the Marquise in her bedchamber, and, in the most delicately composed sequence of the film—a shot of the Marquise in a potion-induced slumber; a cut...
- 8/27/2016
- MUBI
Rushes collects news, articles, images, videos and more for a weekly roundup of essential items from the world of film.NEWSAnton Yelchin in Green RoomUnexpected and tragic news at the end of the weekend was that actor Anton Yelchin (Star Trek, Only Lovers Left Alive, Joe Dante's Burying the Ex, Green Room) was accidentally killed at his home.French New Wave director Éric Rohmer was intensely private, so details of his long, productive life have generally been slim. But now, as Richard Brody writes at the New Yorker, a 2014 biography by Antoine de Baecque and Noël Herpe has been translated into English, and makes for essential reading about one of cinema's greats.We won't get properly excited until, first, the cameras are rolling, and second, there's a hope of some kind of release date, but The Film Stage has gathered enough evidence to point towards what Terrence Malick's next film will be: Radegund,...
- 6/22/2016
- MUBI
Here's something special, a Godard movie about people as much as concepts, and the dialogue doesn't sound as if it belongs in cartoon bubbles. Jean-Luc Godard turns his intellect to the subject of relationships and reveals a lot about himself. It's a beautiful show too -- with the incredible Macha Méril visually cut up for study piece by piece. A Married Woman Blu-ray Entertainment One / Cohen Film Collection 1964 / B&W / 1:37 full frame / 95 min. / Un Femme Marieacute;e / Street Date May 24, 2016 / 39.98 Starring Bernard Noël, Macha Méril, Philippe Leroy, Roger Leenhardt. Cinematography Raoul Coutard Film Editor Andrée Choty, Françoise Collin, Agnès Guillemot, Gérard Pollicand. Written and Directed by Jean-Luc Godard
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Imagine that -- a Jean-Luc Godard film not primarily organized around destructing film language. By 1964 Godard had taken apart the conventions of film editing and structure. He'd plumbed new depths in genre autopsies and blended moving pictures...
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Imagine that -- a Jean-Luc Godard film not primarily organized around destructing film language. By 1964 Godard had taken apart the conventions of film editing and structure. He'd plumbed new depths in genre autopsies and blended moving pictures...
- 5/10/2016
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Hail Mary
Written and directed by Jean-Luc Godard
France, 1985
When Jean-Luc Godard’s 1985 film Hail Mary was initially released, it set off a firestorm of protest. According to an article in a contemporary issue of Film Quarterly, the film was met with everything from “the Pope’s Vatican Radio denunciations and Italian magazine covers depicting barebreasted blondes on crucifixes, to Catholics lighting candles and shaking rosaries outside offending theaters.” The film was banned and was the subject of boycotts, and religious leaders worldwide deemed it blasphemous (a quote from Pope John Paul II, stating that the movie, “deeply wounds the religious sentiments of believers,” was displayed on a previously issued DVD almost as a badge of honor).
At the heart of the controversy, first and foremost, was the plot. Godard’s film is a modern-day retelling of the virgin birth. Here, Mary (Myriem Roussel) is a basketball-playing student who works...
Written and directed by Jean-Luc Godard
France, 1985
When Jean-Luc Godard’s 1985 film Hail Mary was initially released, it set off a firestorm of protest. According to an article in a contemporary issue of Film Quarterly, the film was met with everything from “the Pope’s Vatican Radio denunciations and Italian magazine covers depicting barebreasted blondes on crucifixes, to Catholics lighting candles and shaking rosaries outside offending theaters.” The film was banned and was the subject of boycotts, and religious leaders worldwide deemed it blasphemous (a quote from Pope John Paul II, stating that the movie, “deeply wounds the religious sentiments of believers,” was displayed on a previously issued DVD almost as a badge of honor).
At the heart of the controversy, first and foremost, was the plot. Godard’s film is a modern-day retelling of the virgin birth. Here, Mary (Myriem Roussel) is a basketball-playing student who works...
- 1/10/2014
- by Jeremy Carr
- SoundOnSight
Andre Techine
This new column for Sound on Sight will feature Cahiers du Cinema critics-turned-filmmakers. However, it will not cover the infamous New Wave directors, but four other filmmakers who wrote for the journal and subsequently became directors. What follows is a brief history of the journal and its association with the four filmmakers that will be covered in this column.
I. A Brief History of Cahiers du Cinema
Cahiers du Cinema has been a prominent film journal for the last 60 years, famous for introducing the concept of les politiques des auteurs, which became the auteur theory in North America thanks to Andrew Sarris, and more famous for playing a major role in the French New Wave. The journal has gone through many shifts and turns, beginning with Andre Bazin as the editor-in-chief to the current editor-in-chief Stephane Delorme.
The history of the journal can be broken into six periods:...
This new column for Sound on Sight will feature Cahiers du Cinema critics-turned-filmmakers. However, it will not cover the infamous New Wave directors, but four other filmmakers who wrote for the journal and subsequently became directors. What follows is a brief history of the journal and its association with the four filmmakers that will be covered in this column.
I. A Brief History of Cahiers du Cinema
Cahiers du Cinema has been a prominent film journal for the last 60 years, famous for introducing the concept of les politiques des auteurs, which became the auteur theory in North America thanks to Andrew Sarris, and more famous for playing a major role in the French New Wave. The journal has gone through many shifts and turns, beginning with Andre Bazin as the editor-in-chief to the current editor-in-chief Stephane Delorme.
The history of the journal can be broken into six periods:...
- 9/10/2013
- by Cody Lang
- SoundOnSight
Phaidon Press continue their exceptional work in publishing some of the best books on cinema with Antoine de Baecque’s Cahiers du Cinema on Tim Burton.
The director has always been a personal favourite, as much for his marvellously scrappy and witty drawings and concept art as for his baroque take on the Gothic sensibility. His eye for the ornate shadows and impossible romanticism of the outcast will always resonate and find an audience, yet his directorial sojourns have, of late, met with some critical backlash despite commanding huge box office figures and handsome returns for the studios who invest in the man who was once champion of the strange and unusual.
Any book on Tim Burton needs to be well illustrated and each project covered in de Baecque’s book has a wealth of images from the director’s scratchy concept art to the final on screen image. The...
The director has always been a personal favourite, as much for his marvellously scrappy and witty drawings and concept art as for his baroque take on the Gothic sensibility. His eye for the ornate shadows and impossible romanticism of the outcast will always resonate and find an audience, yet his directorial sojourns have, of late, met with some critical backlash despite commanding huge box office figures and handsome returns for the studios who invest in the man who was once champion of the strange and unusual.
Any book on Tim Burton needs to be well illustrated and each project covered in de Baecque’s book has a wealth of images from the director’s scratchy concept art to the final on screen image. The...
- 12/19/2011
- by Jon Lyus
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
Arthouse movie The Artist could become first silent film in 80 years to win an Academy Award
It's a black-and-white, silent French arthouse film set in the 1920s, with a leading man who looks like Errol Flynn, and a performing Jack Russell who gets the best gags. The Artist was once considered so bonkers and such an appalling commercial risk that when French producers went begging for cash in Paris TV channels laughed in their face, asking who in the 21st century would watch a silent film on a Saturday night.
Yet the film once seen as too preposterous to make has stunned international critics and is now tipped as the first silent film in more than 80 years to win an Oscar, having this week being named best film by the New York Film Critics Circle.
The Artist could also become the first fully French-funded, French-created film to triumph in the...
It's a black-and-white, silent French arthouse film set in the 1920s, with a leading man who looks like Errol Flynn, and a performing Jack Russell who gets the best gags. The Artist was once considered so bonkers and such an appalling commercial risk that when French producers went begging for cash in Paris TV channels laughed in their face, asking who in the 21st century would watch a silent film on a Saturday night.
Yet the film once seen as too preposterous to make has stunned international critics and is now tipped as the first silent film in more than 80 years to win an Oscar, having this week being named best film by the New York Film Critics Circle.
The Artist could also become the first fully French-funded, French-created film to triumph in the...
- 12/1/2011
- by Angelique Chrisafis
- The Guardian - Film News
A look at what's new on DVD today:
"Black Lightning" (2009)
Directed by Dmitriy Kiselev and Aleksandr Voytinskiy
Released by Universal Studios
"Wanted" director Timur Bekmambetov produced this Russian action flick about a man and his flying car, using the same effects team that worked on all of his previous films including "Night Watch." A Russian trailer is here since where we're going, we don't need to understand words.
"7th Hunt" (2010)
Directed by Jon Cohen
Released by Vanguard Cinema
A motley group of young adults are abducted and forced to fend for their survival at an abandoned military training center in the middle of nowhere in Jon Cohen's thriller.
"Alien Vs. Ninja" (2010)
Directed by Seiji Chiba
Released by Funimation
A selection of last year's New York Asian Film Festival, Seiji Chiba's crazy genre mashup may just be "the best and wittiest movie ever to air at 2am on the SyFy Channel" in the future,...
"Black Lightning" (2009)
Directed by Dmitriy Kiselev and Aleksandr Voytinskiy
Released by Universal Studios
"Wanted" director Timur Bekmambetov produced this Russian action flick about a man and his flying car, using the same effects team that worked on all of his previous films including "Night Watch." A Russian trailer is here since where we're going, we don't need to understand words.
"7th Hunt" (2010)
Directed by Jon Cohen
Released by Vanguard Cinema
A motley group of young adults are abducted and forced to fend for their survival at an abandoned military training center in the middle of nowhere in Jon Cohen's thriller.
"Alien Vs. Ninja" (2010)
Directed by Seiji Chiba
Released by Funimation
A selection of last year's New York Asian Film Festival, Seiji Chiba's crazy genre mashup may just be "the best and wittiest movie ever to air at 2am on the SyFy Channel" in the future,...
- 2/21/2011
- by Stephen Saito
- ifc.com
Deux de la vague, to give the film its French title, is a dry, yet continually fascinating documentary on the friendship between François Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard, scripted and narrated by Antoine de Baecque, former editor of Cahiers du Cinéma and biographer of Truffaut. At first the French Catholic Truffaut, a lower-middle-class autodidact, and the Swiss Protestant Godard, an upper-middle-class university graduate, are blood brothers brought together by an almost mystical devotion to the cinema as the source of all truth. They share the same passions for Hitchcock, Hawks, Renoir and Rossellini and engage in critical campaigns at Cahiers. When Truffaut has his breakthrough success with Les Quatre cents coups he uses his new power to help Godard make Breathless, arguably the key film of the nouvelle vague. Then they react differently after les événements of 1968. Increasingly indifferent to politics, Truffaut continues a journey into humanist cinema. Increasingly obsessed by radical politics,...
- 2/13/2011
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
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