From Dumont to Besson: French production on display

by Fabien Lemercier

30/06/2006 - Nine majority and five minority French productions will be screened in the different sections of the 41st Karlovy Vary Festival, which kicks off today. Running through July 8, the Czech event will give a broad overview of the diversity of films made in France, starting with the competition title: This Girl is Mine by Virginie Wagon (see June 14 article), which had a record television audience on June 16 to make it the most popular fiction broadcast on Arte in 2006.

The Horizons section includes 38 features, five of which are French: Flanders [trailer] by Bruno Dumont (Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival – see news and interview); Angel-A [trailer] by Luc Besson; Four Stars [trailer] by Christian Vincent; A Year in My Life [trailer] by Daniel Duval; and the French/Belgian co-productionThe Weakest Is Always Right [trailer] by Lucas Belvaux (see interview).

Other important films lined up are the four US minority productions: Climates [trailer] by Nuri Bilge Ceylan (Turkey), El Custodio [trailer] by Rodrigo Moreno (Argentina/Germany/France), The Wild Blue Yonder by Werner Herzog (Germany/UK/France – see news of the film’s screening at the 2005 Venice Film Festival) and Family Law [trailer] by Daniel Burman (Argentina/Italy/France/Spain).

Gela Babluani’s successful debut feature 13 (Tzameti) [trailer, film focus] (see Focus, including interview with the director), winner of awards at Venice and Sundance, will feature in the Another View section, which this year has selected 32 films for their originality. Other screenings include the Hungarian/Austrian/French co-production Taxidermia [trailer] by György Pálfi.

The future of European cinema in the Variety Critics’ Choice sidebar will see France represented by Brice Cauvin’s Hotel Harabati [trailer] (see interview in Special Report).

Meanwhile, two recent productions are among the seven French features dealing with the theme of adolescence presented in the Visions of Seven - Youth through the Eyes of French Filmmakers section: La première fois que j´ai eu 20 ans (The First Time I Turned Twenty) by Lorraine Lévy and Regular Lovers [trailer] by Philippe Garrel (see interview).

Paris-based outfit Celluloid Dreams (international sales, production, distribution) will be the focus of a special event dedicated to six films by avant-garde artist Matthew Barney.

(Translated from French)