Alliance Francaise de Madras

in association with

NDTV Lumiere and ICAF

presents

LOUIS MALLE FILM FESTIVAL

LOUIS MALLE FILM FESTIVAL - Mon 15th to Fri 19th September 2008, 6:30pm at the South Indian Film Chamber Theatre

Mon 15th Sept 2008 - View Calender
Ascenseur pour l’Echafaud, (Elevators to the gallows) with Maurice Ronet and Jeanne Moreau, 1958 / 88 mins

Florence Carala and her lover Julien Tavernier, an ex - paratrooper want to murder her husband by faking a suicide. But after Julien has killed him and he puts his things in his car, he finds he has forgotten the rope outside the window and he returns to the building to remove it…

Tue 16th Sept 2008 - View Calender
Les Amants, (The lovers) with Jeanne Moreau, Jean-Marc Bory, 1958 / 90 mins

Jeanne Moreau plays a fashion-obsessed provincial wife whose life is changed by a brusquely non-hypocritical young man. Malle’s guiltless treatment of adultery caused a furor when first released; today its genuine passion is still remarkable.

Wed 17th Sept 2008 - View Calender
Feu Follet, (The fire within), 1963 / 108 mins

Life has become unbearably painful for Alain who is in his early 30s. He once used alcohol to dull the pain. Although he is constantly distressed, he leaves the hospital and tries to meet good old friends. None of them will be helpful, increasing Alain’s distress.

Thurs 18th Sept 2008 - View Calender
Au Revoir les Enfants,( Goodbye children), 1987 / 104 min

January 1944. The second semester is beginning at the Petit Collège in Fontainebleau. Julien Quentin, 12 years old, is a natural leader for his classmates. As the semester opens, Father John, the headmaster, brings three new students to the school. One of them, Jean Bonnet, is Julien’s classmate. He vexes but also intrigues Julien and a bond of friendship is created between them. Julien ends up understanding the secrecy of his friend, his name is not Bonnet but Kippelstein, it is Jewish. A cold morning of January, following a denunciation, Gestapo makes an interruption in the college. Jeans father, a Resistance worker and the three Jewish children are taken along.

Fri 19th Sept 2008 - View Calender
Zazie dans le Metro, (Zazie in the metro), 1960 / 89 min

Twelve-year-old Zazie has to spend the weekend with her uncle Gabriel, in Paris, so that her mother can be with her lover. Zazie’s unique obsession is to take a ride on the metro. Unfortunately it is on strike… Such is the beginning of this wild farce based on Raymond Queneau’s masterpiece.

LOUIS MALLE – The Filmmaker

Louis Malle created films that explored life and its meaning, he was a multisfaceted creator : director, writer, producer and documentary film maker… “Everyone has an idea about whatever one wants to do. There always exists a gap between this idea embellished with imagination and the final shape of what is achieved. It is to narrow down this gap that one has to strive endlessly”. These words of Louis Malle somewhat sum up his professional life. His first feature film, Lift to the Gallows (1957), that won the Critics’ Award, was a prophetic start to a remarkable career of a filmmaker for nearly 40 years. The various dimensions accorded by Louis Malle to an ordinary suspense thriller emphasized his quest for exploring the possibilities of cinematographic art. Between awards and admirations on the one hand and scandals and controversies on the other, Louis Malle never hesitated to experiment with different genres. Even when his views were harshly criticized – moralistically as in The Lovers or The Murmur of the Heart, or politically as in Lacombe Lucien – his technical finesse was never questioned.
The eight-part documentary on India (1968), edited from 37 hours of footage that was shot, landed him in an unfortunate and avoidable controversy at that time, though today it is widely appreciated for its sincerity, restraint and aesthetic charm. If his “European point of view” of American life marked his half a dozen films made in America over 12 years of his stay there, back in France in 1987, his touching and award-winning film on the effects of war crimes on a Jewish adolescent (Good-bye Children) pulsated with a typically French sensitivity. The Lifetime Achievement Award for Louis Malle from the British Academy, five years before his death, was truly well-deserved.” —- V.SRIRAM*

*V.SRIRAM is a writer, translator and specialist of French cinema. He has translated some important contemporary French authors into Tamil directly from French since 1980.

EMBASSY OF THE PEOPLES REPUBLIC OF CHINA

&

INDO CINE APPRECIATION FOUNDATION

Present

CHINESE FILM FESTIVAL

2 BECOME 1/ Tin sun yut dui - 3 Sept 2008 6-15pm

Director:Wing-cheong Law - 2006/ Colour / 97 min/ Cantonese

Plot : A regular white-collar woman named Bing, who leads a carefree city life that includes guarding her turf in the office and dating and gossiping with her three girlfriends. However, her carefree life soon turns upside down when she found a lump in her breast. Everything begins to fall apart as she tries to cope with the loss of femininity in a series of bittersweet events. With the help of a happy-go-lucky doctor V and a shy but talented teenager Sing, Bing begins to find new meanings in her turmoil and the will to face her own demons.

Awards:1 nomination

THE BIRTHDAY - 3 Sept 2008 7-45pm

Director Ning Jingwu - 2007 / Colour / 91 min

Plot : Change is in the air as the family gather for Dad’s 65^th birthday, with their house due to be knocked down to make way for a new industrial zone. His wife worries about his illness and how they can ensure that their youngest boy, a simpleton, is looked after. The second son hires a wife for the weekend, while the oldest son is preoccupied with his own secrets, his wife is determined to ensure they get a good share of the compensation for the house. This film highlights the widening generation gap. With their children’s increasingly westernised ideals, the parents are fading victims.

BEAUTIFUL HOMELAND - 4 Sept 2008 6-15pm

Directed by Gao Feng. - 2004 / colour/ 98min

Plot In a charming pasture in western China, a Kazak old man and his family lead a traditional nomadic life. Their peaceful life together is disrupted by a lovesick girl. Soon afterwards, the youngest son decides to leave the pasture for the remote and unpredictable city. In an attempt to persuade him to stay, the old man decides to give all his possessions to him, and even tries to marry him to a widowed daughter-in-law. A struggle for the youngest son’s heart ensues between the unforgettable grassy plain of the Kazakh homeland and the sophisticated allure of the city.

CALL FOR LOVE / Ai qing hu jiao zhuan yi - 4 Sept 2008 8-00pm

Director Zhang Jianya - 2007/ Colour / 95 min/ Mandarin

Plot Call for Love is a surreal comedy about a divorced man (Xu Zheng), who gets a magical mobile phone from a whimsical angel. By pressing the phone’s buttons he finds he can contact 12 beauties, each one stranger than the other. During his quest for variety and new experiences the man learns a valuable lesson about life and love. The film takes us in the middle of a Chinese society caught in the torrents of modernization, where all-mighty technology can no longer satisfy the profound human longing for love.

FULL MOON OVER LIANGZHOU - 5 Sept 2008 6-15pm

Director : Wang Xingjun - 2005/ Colour / 98 min

Plot : This is a historic film based on the book of the Family Tree of Sajia which was written by a Tibetan monk in 1692. The story happened in Liangzhou, today’s Wuwei, Gansu Province, in 1247 AD, showing the peaceful union of Tibet to China. 1247 AD, Kuo Duan the Mongolian King led his men to fight Tibetans for unifying the country as a whole. But Kuo Duan changes his mind and sends his envoy Dao Na Ba to invite Saban, an eminent Tibetan monk to talk in Liangzhou for peace. The eminent monk accepts the invitation and withholds the fight, and leads his nephew Pagpa, to sign the historically renowned “Liangzhou Covenant”, which ends the 400-year war in Tibet and realized the harmonious unification among Tibetan, Mongolian and the Han.

TURPANS LOVE SONGS / Tu Lu Fan Qing Ge - 5 Sept 2008 8-00pm

Director Jin Lini Xi’erzti Yahefu - 2005 / Colour / 94 min

Plot : The Turpan Love Song depicts the life and relationships of two generations of people from an ethnic minority group living in Xinjiang in northwest China. The movie skillfully combines comedy, music and a touch of tragedy. The warm and romantic story tells about Mr. Halike’s family and their attempts to find a husband for their oldest daughter, Kangbarhan. People fall in love and couples will be formed, but there will also be problems. Besides the heartache and worries of the young lovers, some love tangles left unresolved some years back will also eventually reach closure. Generation gaps shrink away when love takes center stage.

UTV World Movies ties-up withIndo Cine Appreciation Foundation to showcase best of world cinema in Chennai

Monthly movie screenings at South Indian Film Chamber Theatre, starting 01 September

New Delhi, August 29, 2008: UTV World Movies, India’s only international movie channel by UTV Network has tied up with Indo Cine Appreciation Foundation in Chennai to showcase contemporary, award-winning, international box office hits starting September at South Indian Film Chamber Theatre.

Taking the movie experience beyond just Hollywood, World Movies will screen big international titles in French, Spanish, Polish, Dutch, Thai, Japanese, Korean, Cantonese, German, Persian to name a few. These movies come with English subtitles.

Dilshad Master, COO, UTV Entertainment Television Limited, said, “We are proud to associate with Indo Cine Appreciation Foundation for introducing screenings of Worlds greatest movies in India. Through these movie screenings we promise to entertain movie lovers and bring to them an experience like never before.”

NOBODY’s PERFECT/Va a ser que nadie es perfecto /2006 /Col/105″ / Spain/Dir:Joaquín Oristrell/ 1st Sept/6-15pm

Plot Well, if you think cinema’s all about six packs, all-rounded hero, Nobody’s Perfect will be an eye-opener for you. The film narrates stories of three men and a women, who could be described as differently-abled. Carlos is blind, Dani is deaf and Ruben has lost his left leg. The film opens in a courtroom where Dani, the deaf is the interpreter and who prefers to interpret only what he feels like. Carlos, sells lottery tickets and Ruben teaches swimming. It takes you a while to realize as the director introduces all three characters one by one that they’re different. All three meet to celebrate an anniversary. The film treats these three characters rather “normally” in the beginning but gradually as you get closer to them, a whole new world starts unfolding that ranges from stereotypical to touching. Awards:2 wins & 2 nominations

YOUR NAME IS JUSTIN / 2005 / Dutch / colour / 1st Sept/8.00 pm
Plot Two women and a man become acquainted at a convention regarding dream interpretation research. Natalia (Angie Cepeda) publicly relates a recurring dream she has regarding a distinctive tattoo and a man repeatedly crying out her name. Beatriz (Laia Marull) seeks out Natalia later to state she has been having identical visions, and thinks she may have insights as to what it’s about. Alex, a Casanova of sorts, becomes involved with both the ladies.