French Film Festival 2009 @ UP Diliman

UP Film Institute screens selected titles from the 14th French Film Festival presented by the Embassy of France in the Philippines .

FRENCH FILM FESTIVAL 2009
PRESENTED BY EMBASSY OF FRANCE – FREE ADMISSION
UP FILM INSTITUTE, UP DILIMAN

July 1 Wednesday

2:30 p.m.
La Pianiste (The Piano Teacher)
Directed by Michael Haneke
Winner of Grand Prize of the Jury, Best Actor for Benoit Magimel, Best Actress for Isabelle Huppert—2001 Festival de Cannes
For mature viewing
* Preceded by talk (Overview of the National Cinema of France) with UP Film Institute Faculty Member Patrick Campos

5 p.m.
Les Quatre Cents Coups
(In French without English subtitles especially for French majors and language students)
Directed by Francois Truffaut
Winner of Best Director—1959 Festival de Cannes

7:30 p.m.
Ca Brule
Directed by Claire Simon
Official Selection for Quinzaine de Realisateurs—2006 Festival de Cannes

July 2 Thursday

2:30 p.m.
Marie-Jo et Ses Deux Amours (Marie-Jo and Her Two Lovers)
Directed by Robert Guediguian
Official Selection for Palme d’Or—2002 Festival de Cannes
For mature viewing

5 p.m.
Home
Directed by Yann Arthus-Bertrand

7:30 p.m.
La Pianiste (The Piano Teacher)
*Repeat Showing

@ THE VIDEOTHEQUE/ ISHMAEL BERNAL GALLERY – Parallel Screenings

July 2 Thursday
5 p.m. & 7:30 p.m.
A Tout de Suite (Right Now)
Directed by Benoit Jacquot
Official Selection for Un Certain Regard—2004 Festival de Cannes
For mature viewing
*@ the Videotheque (Limited Seats) to be followed by an open forum and a repeat showing at the Ishmael Bernal Gallery

WEEKEND ENGAGEMENT - Main Cinema Screenings

July 4 Saturday

2:30 p.m.
Home
*Repeat Showing

5 p.m.
Van Gogh
Directed by Maurice Pialat
Official Selection for Palme d’Or—1991 Festival de Cannes

7:30 p.m.
Marie-Jo et Ses Deux Amours (Marie-Jo and Her Two Lovers)
*Repeat Showing

Admission is FREE. Screenings at Cine Adarna—UP Film Institute’s cinema building along Magsaysay Avenue in UP Diliman next to the Carillon Tower and the UP Theater across Bahay ng Alumni. Call cinema hotline for further details: 9263640.

FILMS IN EXHIBITION:

ÇA BRULE
Director: Claire Simon
Cast: Camille Varenne, Gilbert Melki, Olivia Willaumez, Kader Mohamed, Marion Maintenay, Morgane Moré, Jean-Quentin Châtelain, Nabil Radi, Mathieu Bagnis
Running time: 1h 51mn

She lives in the Var, she has a horse, and she’s angry.
The exalted love story of an adolescent 15-year-old, with a local man: Jean, 37 years old, teacher, voluntary fireman, married and father of two. It’s the beginning of vacation and the eternity of summer.

LA PIANISTE

Director: Michael Haneke
Cast: Isabelle Huppert, Benoît Magimel, Annie Girardot, Anna Sigalevitch, Susanne Lothar, Udo Samel
Running Time: 2h 10mn

Erika Kohut, 40 years old, is a respectable piano teacher at the Conservatory of Vienna. Living a single life, hardened by a possessive mother, she is a musician who leads a frustrated sex life. Frequenting peep shows and watching porno films, Erika dives into a morbid voyeurism and practices masochism. Until one day, when Walter, a 20-something student falls in love with her. From this affection is born a troubled relationship, emotional and perverted, between master and disciple.

MARIE JO ET SES DEUX AMOURS

Director: Robert Guédiguian
Cast: Ariane Ascaride, Jean-Pierre Darroussin, Gérard Meylan, Julie-Marie Parmentier, Jacques Boudet, Yann Trégouët, Frédérique Bonnal, Souhade Temimi, Maïa Sevleyan, Frédéric Garbe, Danielle Stefan, Jacques Germain, Axel Koehler

Running Time: 2h 5mn
Marie-Jo loves her husband Daniel dearly, but is also passionately in love with her lover Marco. She is torn between the two, with tragic consequences.

HOME

Director: Yann Arthus-Bertrand
Running time: 2h

In 200, 000 years, humans have disrupted the fragile balance on which Earth was living for 4 billion years. Global warming, shortage of resources, endangered species: humans are jeopardizing their own living conditions. By the end of the century, the relentless consumption will have exhausted almost all of our planet’s natural resources. But it is too late to be pessimistic: we have barely 10 years left to reverse the trend. We need to become aware of our abusive exploitation of Earth’s gifts and change our way of life.

Home is a travel notebook, showing landscapes captured from a bird’s eye view above. This film calls for a new awareness, inviting the viewer to stop for a moment in order to look at our planet and realize how we treat her treasures and her beauty.

VAN GOGH

Director: Maurice Pialat
Cast: Jacques Dutronc, Gérard Séty, Bernard Le Coq, Alexandra London, Elsa Zylberstein, Corinne Bourdon, Lise Lamétrie
Running time: 2h 35min

Under the care of Doctor Gachet, Vincent Van Gogh arrives in Auvers-sur-Oise in 1890. This is the most productive period of his life, as he finishes hundreds of paintings and drawings in a span of weeks. And yet it is also his most torturous, as he lives out his last days torn between love and despair.

400 COUPS

This film is part of the Antoine Doinel Saga
Director: François Truffaut
Cast: Jean-Pierre Léaud, Claire Maurier, Albert Rémy
Running Time: 1h 33min.

This largely autobiographical film by François Truffaut tells the story of the young Antoine, an adolescent with a reputation for being a troublemaker. But is he really a troublemaker, or just a victim of harsh, uncaring adults?

A TOUT DE SUITE (RIGHT NOW)

Director: Benoît Jacquot
Cast: Isild Le Besco, Ouassini Embarek, Nicolas Duvauchelle, Laurence Cordier, Fotini Kodoukaki, Catherine Davenier, Nicolas Pignon, David Ayala, Odile Vuillemin, Léonor Graser, Emmanuelle Bercot, Olivier Augrond, Sabri Lahmer, Fatiha Chériguene
Running time : 1h 35mn

Set in the 1970s, A Tout de Suite is the story of a 19-year-old girl who discovers that her lover, seemingly a Prince Charming, is actually a thief who has just committed murder. “Tout de suite,” instantly, her safe and comfortable world is turned upside down and she is swept into an adventure that takes her from Spain to Morocco and Greece.

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14th French Film Festival in Manila

The 14th French Film Festival in Manila (June 5-14, 2009)

The festival opens on Friday, June 5, 2009 at 6:30 p.m. at the Grand Atrium Level 2 of Shangri-La Plaza

The 62nd Cannes film festival marks a milestone in the history of Philippine cinema as Brillante “Dante” Mendoza becomes the first Filipino to be awarded the “Best Director” prize for his film “Kinatay.” 2009 will also be remembered as the year that saw five Filipino films in the different sections of the festival: “Kinatay” in the Official Competition, “Independencia” by Raya Martin in Un Certain Regard, “Manila” by Adolfo Alix, Jr and Raya Martin in the Special Screening, “Sabongero” by Janice Perez and “Manong Maong” by Aissa Peñafiel and Miguel Ocampo in the Short Film Corner.

In celebration of this event, the 14th French Film Festival in Manila will be held from June 5-14, 2009 at the Shang Cineplex of Shangri-La Plaza. It will feature a retrospective of 14 French films which have been presented at the Cannes film festival, as well as a sneak preview of the Filipino film “Independencia”, which premiered at Cannes earlier this month.

The festival will open on June 5 with the film “Home” by the famous French photographer Yann Arthus Bertrand. Shot entirely from the sky in high definition, “Home” is a documentary about the stunning beauty of our planet and the alarming danger it faces. It will also be the first movie to be released simultaneously on all media (theatre, TV, DVD and Internet) across 5 continents, as part of World Environment Day, which also be celebrated worldwide on June 5 (www.goodplanet.org).

On June 12, Independence Day, the festival will present a sneak preview of “Independencia”. Produced by Arleen Cuevas, the film has received assistance from the French government through the Fonds Sud Cinema, a grant offered by the French Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs.

There will be four screenings each day of the festival. All films are open to the public with free admission on a first-come, first-served basis. The French films that will be screened include François Truffaut’s “Les 400 Coups” (1959), André Téchiné’s “Ma Saison Préférée” (1993), Michael Haneke’s “La Pianiste” (2001) and Benoît Jaquot’s “A tout de suite” (2004). For screening schedules, you may call 633-2277 or visit www.spot.ph.

For Filipino cinephiles who will not be able to attend the Manila screenings, there will also be a French Film Festival in Cebu which will run from June 19-21 at the Ayala Center Cebu. This event will feature many of the same films that will be shown in Manila.

The French Film Festival is organized by the French Embassy to the Philippines, together with CulturesFrance and Alliance Française de Manille, with the generous support of Shangri-La Plaza, the Shang Cineplex, Pioneer Films and Spot.ph. The French Film Festival in Cebu is organized through the efforts of Les Amis de la France and with the cooperation of the Arts Council of Cebu, and Ayala Center Cebu.

The logo of the festival shows the intertwined laurel branch of the Cannes Film Festival and a coconut branch to symbolize the strong cultural ties between France and the Philippines through cinema.

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