Some highlights from the last five days of the 2017 COLCOA FRENCH FILM FESTIVAL:
A glossy biopic of a great star of the sixties and seventies, played by an unknown in a tour-de-force performance—DALIDA, starring Italian model Sveva Alviti. With Riccardo Scamarcio, Niels Schneider, and COLCOA favorite Nicolas Duvauchelle as socialite “Le Comte de Saint-Germain.” Friday night, April 28, at 8:30 pm.
A TASTE OF INK / COMPTE TES BLESSURES. The post-punk music scene in Paris sets the stage for an explosive triangle: underground singer Vincent (Kévin Azaïs), his widowed father, and his father’s new, much younger girlfriend. This debut film by writer–director Morgan Simon screens on Saturday afternoon, April 29, at 1:20 pm.
Pre-fest screenings of A BAG OF MARBLES / UN SAC DE BILLES have triggered a strong emotional response. The Christian Duguay film screens early Saturday evening, April 29, at 5 pm.
MONSIEUR ET MADAME ADELMAN—the feature debut of playwright and political satirist Nicolas Bedos, about an egomaniacal writer and his wife—could be as divisive as last year’s Mon Roi. See for yourself on Saturday night, April 29, at 8:30 pm.
Romain Duris is a veteran of trench warfare trying to put his life back together in CEASE–FIRE / CESSEZ–LE–FEU, directed by Emmanuel Courcol, and screening on Monday afternoon, May 1, at 3:10 pm.
Lucie (comic Florence Foresti in a dramatic role) has survived cancer. Now she’s trying to recover from her recovery in Anne-Gaëlle Daval’s LADIES / DE PLUS BELLE, which co-stars Nicole Garcia and Mathieu Kassovitz. Monday evening, May 1, at 5:40 pm.
The story of Seine-Saint-Denis writer–performer Fabien Marsaud—his crippling swimming accident when he was 19, his recovery, and his rise as slam poet Grand Corps Malade—is told in STEP BY STEP / PATIENTS, co-directed by GCM and Mehdi Idir. Monday night, May 1, at 8:30.
In addition to these ticketed events, the following free screenings are available, first come, first served:
PLAYTIME (1967, restored, directed by Jacques Tati)
Saturday morning, April 29 at 10:50 am.
And all four screenings on Tuesday afternoon and early evening, May 2, are free.
These reruns of festival favorites screen in two DGA cinemas at 1 pm, 3:15 pm, 3:45 pm, and 5:45 pm. Titles will be announced the evening before on COLCOA’s website, Facebook, and Twitter.
COLCOA FRENCH FILM FESTIVAL
Through May 2.
Directors Guild of America
7920 Sunset Boulevard, Hollywood.
Special thanks to Karine Choi at Big Time PR.
Top: Florence Foresti and Mathieu Kassovitz in Ladies / De plus belle.
Above: Romain Duris (left) in Cease-fire / Cessez-le-feu.
Below: Kévin Azaïs in A Taste of Ink / Compte tes blessures. Image credit: Cineuropa