Best French Films Ever.

Top Rated French Movies: popular, classic, famous "must watch" Cinema Français Great Movie Pictures Old and New

The titles (in the US) of the best French films, sorted by title

Title Year Genre Director 1 2001 Music, Comedy, Crime, Mystery François Ozon 2 A Heart in Winter 1992 Romance, Drama, Music 3 Beauty and The Beast 1946 Fantasy Drama, Romance Jean Cocteau 4 Belle de Jour 1967 Erotic Drama Luis Buñuel 5 1986 Romace, Drama Jean-Jacques Beineix 6 Birds Of A Feather 1978 Comedy Edouard Molinaro 7 Bitter Moon 1992 Sado-masochistic Erotic Drama Roman Polanski 8 Breathless 1960 Drama, Romance Jean-Luc Godard 9 Children of Paradise 1945 Drama, Romance Marcel Carne 10 Cyrano de Bergerac 1990 Romance, Drama Jean-Paul Rappeneau 11 Delicatessen 1991 Sci-Fi Comedy Marc Caro & Jean-Pierre Jeunet 12 Diva 1981 Action Thriller, Drama Jean-Jacques Beineix 13 French Twist 1995 Comedy Josiane Balasko 14 Hidden 2005 Drama Michael Haneke 15 Hiroshima, Mon Amour 1959 Romance, Drama Alain Resnais 16 1986 Drama, Modernised Greek Tragedy Claude Berri 17 Jesus of Montreal 1989 Drama Denys Arcand 18 Jules et Jim 1961 Romance, Drama François Truffaut 19 La Controverse de Valladolid 1992 History (16thC), Drama Jean-Daniel Verhaeghe 20 La Femme Nikita 1990 Crime, Thriller, Romance, Drama Luc Besson 21 Manon of the Spring 1986 Drama, Romance, modernised Greek Tragedy Claude Berri 22 Monsieur Hire 1989 Crime Thriller, Romance, Drama 23 My Life in Pink 1997 Comedy Drama Alain Berliner 24 One Swallow Brought Spring 2001 Comedy, Romance, Drama Christian Carion 25 Queen Margot 1994 History (16thC) Drama, Biography, History, Romance Patrice Chéreau 26 Ridicule 1996 History (18thC) Drama Patrice Leconte 27 Swimming Pool 2003 Psychological Thriller, Mystery Drama François Ozon 28 1959 Crime Drama François Truffaut 29 The Big Blue 1988 Drama, Romance Luc Besson 30 The City of Lost Children 1995 Adventure, Comedy, Drama, Fantasy, Sci-Fi Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro 31 The Closet 2001 Comedy Drama Francis Veber 32 The Discrete Charm of the Bougoisie 1972 Surreal Black Comedy, Drama, Fantasy Luis Buñuel 33 The Double Life of Veronique 1991 Music, Fantasy, Romance, Psychological Drama Krzysztof Kieslowski 34 The Fabulous Destiny of Amelie Poulain 2001 Comedy, Romance, Drama Jean-Pierre Jeunet 35 The 1999 Comedy, Romance, Fantasy, Drama Patrice Leconte 36 The Hate 1995 Crime, Drama Mathieu Kassovitz 37 1980 Romance, History (WW2) Drama François Truffaut 38 Teacher 2001 Drama, Music Michael Haneke 39 The Reader 1988 Mildly Erotic Comedy Fantasy Michel Deville 40 The Return of Martin Guerre 1982 History (16thC) Drama, Biography, Crime, Mystery, Daniel Vigne 41 The Visitors 1993 Fantasy, Comedy Jean-Marie Poiré 42 Three Colors: Blue 1993 Drama, Music, Mystery, Romance Krzysztof Kieslowski 43 Three Colors: Red 1994 Drama, Mystery, Romance Krzysztof Kieslowski 44 Three Colors: White 1994 Comedy, Drama, Mystery, Romance Krzysztof Kieslowski

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The titles (in France) of the best French films, sorted by title

Title Year Genre Director 1 37°2 Le matin 1986 Romace, Drama Jean-Jacques Beineix 2 8 Femmes 2001 Music, Comedy, Crime, Mystery François Ozon 3 À bout de souffle 1960 Drama, Romance Jean-Luc Godard 4 Belle de jour 1967 Erotic Drama Luis Buñuel 5 Caché 2005 Drama Michael Haneke 6 Cyrano de Bergerac 1990 Romance, Drama Jean-Paul Rappeneau 7 Delicatessen 1991 Sci-Fi Comedy Marc Caro & Jean-Pierre Jeunet 8 Diva 1981 Action Thriller, Drama Jean-Jacques Beineix 9 Gazon maudit 1995 Comedy Josiane Balasko 10 Hiroshima, mon amour 1959 Romance, Drama Alain Resnais 11 Jean de Florette 1986 Drama, Modernised Greek Tragedy Claude Berri 12 Jésus de Montréal 1989 Drama Denys Arcand 13 Jules et Jim 1961 Romance, Drama François Truffaut 14 La belle et la bête 1946 Fantasy Drama, Romance Jean Cocteau 15 La cage aux folles 1978 Comedy Edouard Molinaro 16 La cité des enfants perdus 1995 Adventure, Comedy, Drama, Fantasy, Sci-Fi Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro 17 La controverse de Valladolid 1992 History (16thC), Drama Jean-Daniel Verhaeghe 18 La double vie de Véroniquee 1991 Music, Fantasy, Romance, Psychological Drama Krzysztof Kieslowski 19 La fille sur le pont 1999 Comedy, Romance, Fantasy, Drama Patrice Leconte 20 1995 Crime, Drama Mathieu Kassovitz 21 La lectrice 1988 Mildly Erotic Comedy Fantasy Michel Deville 22 La pianiste 2001 Drama, Music Michael Haneke 23 La reine Margot 1994 History (16thC) Drama, Biography, History, Romance Patrice Chéreau 24 Le charme discret de la bourgeoisie 1972 Surreal Black Comedy, Drama, Fantasy Luis Buñuel 25 Le dernier métro 1980 Romance, History (WW2) Drama François Truffaut 26 Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain 2001 Comedy, Romance, Drama Jean-Pierre Jeunet 27 Le grand bleu 1988 Drama, Romance Luc Besson 28 Le placard 2001 Comedy Drama Francis Veber 29 Le retour de Martin Guerre 1982 History (16thC) Drama, Biography, Crime, Mystery, Daniel Vigne 30 Les enfants du paradis 1945 Drama, Romance Marcel Carne 31 Les quatre cents coups 1959 Crime Drama François Truffaut 32 Les visiteurs 1993 Fantasy, Comedy Jean-Marie Poiré 33 Lunes de fiel 1992 Sado-masochistic Erotic Drama Roman Polanski 34 Ma vie en rose 1997 Comedy Drama Alain Berliner 35 Manon des sources 1986 Drama, Romance, modernised Greek Tragedy Claude Berri 36 Monsieur Hire 1989 Crime Thriller, Romance, Drama Patrice Leconte 37 Nikita 1990 Crime, Thriller, Romance, Drama Luc Besson 38 Ridicule 1996 History (18thC) Drama Patrice Leconte 39 Swimming Pool 2003 Psychological Thriller, Mystery Drama François Ozon 40 Trois couleurs: Blanc 1994 Comedy, Drama, Mystery, Romance Krzysztof Kieslowski 41 Trois couleurs: Bleu 1993 Drama, Music, Mystery, Romance Krzysztof Kieslowski 42 Trois couleurs: Rouge 1994 Drama, Mystery, Romance Krzysztof Kieslowski 43 Un coeur en hiver 1992 Romance, Drama, Music Claude Sautet 44 Une hirondelle a fait le printemps 2001 Comedy, Romance, Drama Christian Carion

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French Cinema

France is the birthplace of cinema and has been responsible for many innovations in cinematography. Important cinematic movements, including the New Wave (Nouvelle Vague) began in France. France is proud its strong film industry which is distinctively French. Notable features of typical French cinema include:

slow, subtle and ambiguous plot-lines strong character development no expectation of happy, predictable, neat or conclusive endings an emphasis on art rather than revenue - partly assisted by state subsidies

These elements characterise a product that is noticeably different from the typical output of Hollywood and Bollywood. A few French films have become popular in the English speaking world, but most are completely unknown except to art-house and Francophone audiences. Many successful French films are remade for English speaking audiences who are generally unaware of the fact. Aficionados familiar with both the French original and the English remake rarely regard the remake as remotely as good as the French original. Le Retour de Martin Guerre was remade as Summersby, La Cage Aux Folles, remade as Birdcage Cyrano de Bergerac, ill-advisedly remade with the same name featuring Steve Martin, and Les Visiteurs remade as The Visitors. La Femme Nikita somehow morphed into a US television series!

The French are particularly good at historical dramas such as Le Retour de Martin Guerre, La Controverse de Valladolid, La Reine Margot, Ridicule and Jean de Florette / Manon Des Sources.

French Film Makers

French language films are made not only in France but other French Speaking countries, such as Canada, Belgium and Switzerland. French cinema is sometimes intertwined with the cinema of other nations. Directors from Poland (Roman Polanski, Krzysztof Kieslowski, and Andrzej Zulawski, Argentina (Gaspar Noe and Edgardo Cozarinsky), Russia (Alexandre Alexeieff, Anatole Litvak) and Georgia (Gela Babluani, Otar Iosseliani) are as famous in French cinema as the native French. French directors have been important in the development of cinema in other countries, most notably Luc Besson in the United States.

History of French Cinema

In the late 19th century, during the early years of cinema, Frenchmen Auguste and Louis Lumière invented the cinématographe and their L'Arrivée d'un train en gare de La Ciotat in Paris in 1895 is considered by many historians to mark the birth of cinematography. Alice Guy Blaché made her first film, La Fée aux Choux, in 1896. During the next few years, filmmakers all over the world started experimenting with this new medium. Georges Méliès invented many of the techniques now common in the cinematic language, and made the first science fiction film Le Voyage dans la Lune (A Trip to the Moon) in 1902. Alice Guy Blaché was head of production at Gaumont Pictures, where she made some 400 films between 1897 and 1906. She then continued her career in the United States, as did Maurice Tourneur and Léonce Perret after the First World War. During the period between the First World War and the Second World War, Jacques Feyder became one of the founders of poetic realism in French cinema. He dominated French Impressionist Cinema along with Abel Gance, Germaine Dulac and Jean Epstein.

After the First World War, the French film industry suffered through a lack of capital. Film production decreased as it did in other European countries. This allowed the United States film industry to enter the European cinema market, most notably Britain and Ireland, because American films could be sold more cheaply than European productions, the studios having already recouped their costs in the home market. When film studios in Europe began to fail, many European countries began to set import barriers. France installed an import quota. For every seven foreign films imported to France, one French film was to be produced and shown in French cinemas.

In 1931, Marcel Pagnol filmed the first of his great trilogy, Marius, Fanny, and César. He followed this with other films including La Femme du Boulanger (The Baker's Wife). Other notable films of the 1930s included René Clair's Sous les Toits de Paris (Under the Roofs of Paris, 1930), Jacques Feyder's La kermesse héroïque (Carnival in Flanders, 1935), and Julien Duvivier's La belle equipe (They Were Five, 1936). In 1935, renowned playwright and actor Sacha Guitry directed his first film and went on to make more than 30 films that were precursors to the New Wave era. In 1937, Jean Renoir, the son of painter Pierre- Auguste Renoir, directed what many see as his first masterpiece, La Grande Illusion (Grand Illusion). In 1939, Renoir directed La Règle du Jeu (The Rules of the Game). Several critics have cited this film as one of the greatest of all-time.

Marcel Carné's Les Enfants du Paradis (Children of Paradise) was filmed during the First World WarI and released in 1945. The three-hour film was difficult to make due to the Nazi occupation. Set in Paris in 1828, it was voted Best French Film of the Century in a poll of 600 French critics and professionals in the late 1990s.

In the magazine Cahiers du cinéma founded by André Bazin, critics and lovers of film would discuss film and why it worked. Modern film theory was born there. Additionally, Cahiers critics such as Jean-Luc Godard, François Truffaut, Claude Chabrol, and Eric Rohmer went on to make films themselves, creating what was to become known as the French New Wave. Some of the first films of this new genre were Godard's Les Quatre Cent Coups (Breathless) in 1960, starring Jean-Paul Belmondo, and Truffaut's À Bout de Souffle (Breathless) in 1959 starring Jean-Pierre Léaud. From 1959 until 1979, Truffaut followed Léaud's character , who falls in love with Christine Darbon in Baisers volés ( ) marries her in Domicile Conjugal (Bed & Board 1970) and separates from her in the last post-New Wave movie L'amour en fuite (Love on the Run).

Contemporaries of Godard and Truffaut followed their lead, and some achieved international critical acclaim with styles of their own, such as the minimalist films of Robert Bresson and Jean-Pierre Melville, the Hitchcockian-like thrillers of Henri-Georges Clouzot, and other New Wave films by Agnès Varda and Alain Resnais. The movement became an inspiration to other national cinemas and was a string influence on the future New Hollywood directors.

During this period, French commercial film also made a name for itself. Popular French comedies starring Louis de Funes topped the French box office. The war comedy La Grande Vadrouille (1966), from Gérard Oury with Bourvil and featuring Terry Thomas (!) was the most successful film in French theaters for more than 30 years. Another example was La Folie Des Grandeurs with Yves Montand. French cinema also was the birthplace for many sub-genres of the crime film, most notably the modern caper film, starting with Du Rififi Chez les Hommes (Refifi, 1955) by American-born director Jules Dassin and followed by a large number of serious noir-ish heist dramas along with more playful playful caper comedies throughout the sixties. also popular was the "polar," a typical French blend of film noir and detective fiction. In addition, French movie stars began to acheive fame abroad as well as at home. Popular actors of the period included Alain Delon, Romy Schneider, Jeanne Moreau, Simone Signoret, Yves Montand, , Jean-Paul Belmondo, Brigitte Bardot, and Jean Gabin.

The 1979 film La Cage Aux Folles ran for well over a year at the Paris Theatre, an art house cinema in New York City, and was a commercial success at theaters throughout the country, in both urban and rural areas. It won the Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film, and for years it remained the most successful foreign film to be released in the United States.

Jean-Jacques Beineix's Diva (1981) sparked the beginning of the 1980s wave of French cinema. Movies which followed in its wake included 37°2 Le Matin (Betty Blue) by Beineix, Le Grand Bleu (The Big Blue, 1988) by Luc Besson, and (Les Amants du Pont-Neuf (The Lovers on the Bridge , 1991) by Léos Carax. These films, made with a slick commercial style and emphasizing the alienation of its main characters, was known as "Cinema du look" Camille Claudel, directed by newcomer Bruno Nuytten and starring Isabelle Adjani and Gérard Depardieu, was a major commercial success in 1988, earning Adjani, who was also the film's co-producer, a César Award for best actress.

Gérard Depardieu was one of the most active French actors of the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. Jean-Paul Rappeneau's Cyrano de Bergerac was a major box- office success in 1990, earning several César Awards, including best actor for Gérard Depardieu, as well as an Academy Award nomination for best foreign picture. Depardieu also starred in Le Retour de Martin Guerre and Jean de Florette / Manon Des Sources.

Jean-Pierre Jeunet made Delicatessen and La Cité Des Enfants Perdus (The City of Lost Children) both of which featured strange and disturbing fantasy worlds.

In 1992, Claude Sautet co-wrote (with Jacques Fieschi) and directed UN Coeur En Hiver considered by many to be a masterpiece. Roman Polanski made a wonderfully dark movie the same year Lunes de Fiel (Bitter Moon) - with most of the action in French but most opf the dialogue in English - a great precedent for blurring French and English language films.

Mathieu Kassovitz's 1995 film La Haine (Hate) made Vincent Cassel a star.and in 1997, Juliette Binoche won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in The English Patient. That same year, Luc Besson's The Fifth Element became a cult favorite.

The success of Michel Ocelot's Kirikou and the Sorceress in 1998 rejuvenated the production of original feature-length animated films by such filmmakers as Jean-François Laguionie and Sylvain Chomet.

In 2001, after a brief stint in Hollywood, Jean-Pierre Jeunet returned to France with Amèlie (Le Fabuleux Destin d'Amélie Poulain) starring Audrey Tautou and Mathieu Kassovitz. It became the highest-grossing French-language film ever released in the United States. The following year, Brotherhood of the Wolf became the second-highest-grossing French-language film in the United States..

In 2008, Marion Cotillard won the Academy Award for Best Actress and the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role for her portrayal of legendary French singer Edith Piaf in La Moôme (La Vie en Rose), the first French-language performance to be so honored. The film won two Oscars and four BAFTAs and became the third-highest-grossing French-language film in the United States in the last two decades. Cotillard was second person (and the first woman) and to win both an Academy Award and César Award for the same performance.

In the 2000s, several French directors made international productions, often in the action genre. These include Gérard Pirès (Riders, 2002), Pitof (Catwoman), Jean-François Richet (Assault on Precinct 13), Florent Emilio Siri (Hostage), Christophe Gans (Silent Hill), Mathieu Kassovitz (Babylon A.D.), Louis Leterrier (The Incredible Hulk), Alexandre Aja (Mirrors), and Pierre Morel (Taken).. The 2008 rural comedy Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis drew an audience of more than 20 million, the first French film to do so. Its $193 million gross in France puts it just behind Titanic as the most successful film of all time in French theaters.At the 2008 Cannes Film Festival, Entre les murs (The Class) won the Palme d'Or, the first French victory at the festival in 21 years.

As the advent of television threatened the success of cinema, countries were again faced with the problem of reviving movie-going. The French cinema market, and more generally the French-speaking market, is smaller than the English-speaking market.. As a consequence, French movies have to recoup their costs on a relatively small market and thus generally have budgets far lower than their American counterparts, ruling out expensive settings and special effects. The highly interventionist French government has implemented measures aimed at supporting local film production and movie theaters. The Canal+ TV channel has a broadcast license imposing it to support the production of movies. Taxes are levied on movies and TV channels for use as subsidies for French movie production, some tax breaks are given for investment in movie productions, and the sale of DVDs and videocassettes of movies shown in theaters is prohibited for six months after the showing in theaters, to ensure some revenue for movie theaters. French national and regional governments involve themselves in film production. For example, the award-winning documentary Le Pays Des sourds (In the Land of the Deaf) was created by Nicolas Philibert in 1992. The film was co-produced by a multinational partners, which reduced the financial risks inherent in the project; and co-production also ensured enhanced distribution opportunities.

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