Tag Archives: Mathieu Kassovitz

COLCOA 2019 — LADJ LY’S LES MISÉRABLES

COLCOA—the annual French film festival in Los Angeles—gets off to a dynamic start this week with the local premiere of Ladj Ly’s acclaimed banlieue drama LES MISÉRABLES, which won the Prix du jury at the 2019 Festival de Cannes and will represent France at the Academy Awards in February.

Inspired by the work of Spike Lee, Jacques Audiard, Raymond Depardon, and Mathieu Kassovitz’s La Haine, Ly’s debut feature tracks the power games and unchecked aggression between the gangs of Clichy-Montfermeil and three of the cops—played by Djebril Zonga, Alexis Manenti, and Damien Bonnard—attached to the district. Jeanne Balibar co-stars as the police chief.

It’s easy to live with each other when you have money. When you don’t, it’s a lot more complicated: you need compromises, arrangements, little deals… It’s a matter of survival. For the cops too, they are in survival mode. [With] LES MISÉRABLES, I’ve tried to be as fair as possible… I was ten years old when I was first stopped and searched by the police, which tells you how well I know cops, how long I’ve lived close by them.Ladj Ly

On opening night, the director will be joined by cast members Zonga and Bonnard for a post-screening conversation. Bonnard will return on Friday for the encore presentation.

LES MISÉRABLES

Monday, September 23, at 7:30 pm.

Friday, September 27, at 5 pm.

Directors Guild of America

7920 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles.

Ladj Ly, Les Misérables (2019), stills, from top: 2018 World Cup victory celebration in Paris, which opens the film; Damien Bonnard (left), Alexis Manenti, and Djebril Zonga; banlieue residents; Zonga, in front of wall mural by JR—part of the artist’s 28 Millimètres, Portrait of a Generation series—depicting Ladj Ly holding video camera; confrontation between Manenti and banlieue resident; young actors; film scene. Images courtesy and © the filmmaker, the actors, the producers, Wild Bunch, and Amazon Studios.

HANEKE’S BACK

Bourgeois eviscerator Michael Haneke is back with the droll, disjunctive HAPPY END, where all the adults, infantalized by their status, behave like children. Given the director’s cool detachment, this never descends into slapstick—until a joyous final iPhone shot of Anne (Isabelle Huppert) running to rescue her father (Jean-Louis Trintignant) from the abyss.

 

HAPPY END, now playing.

ROYAL, 11523 Santa Monica Boulevard, West Los Angeles.

laemmle.com/films

See: huffingtonpost.com/michael-hanekes-timely-take-down

Fantine Harduin and Mathieu Kassovitz in Happy End (2017). Image credit: Sony Pictures Classics.

Image result for HAPPY END HANEKEHANEKE’S BACK

 

COLCOA — L’ENVOI

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 ScamarcioNiels 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