2015 FRENCH FILM FESTIVAL Presented by Brown University at the Cable Car Cinema February 25 – March 3, 2015

Abus de faiblesse (Abuse of Weakness) Gemma Bovery Catherine Breillat, dir | France | 2013 | 105m , dir | France | 2014 | 99m Cast: Isabelle Huppert, Kool Shen, Laurence Ursino Cast: Fabrice Luchini, Gemma Arterton, Jason Flemyng FRIDAY, FEB 27 @ 9PM AND TUESDAY, MAR 3 @ 4:30PM WEDNESDAY, FEB 25 @ 6:30PM AND SUNDAY, MAR 1 @ 9PM Inspired by director Catherine Breillat’s true life Martin, an ex-Parisian and well-heeled hipster who is experiences, Abuse of Weakness is an exploration of passionate about Gustave Flaubert, settles in to a power and sex. Isabelle Huppert stars as Maud, a strong Norman village as a baker, and sees an English couple willed filmmaker who suffers a stroke. Bedridden, but moving into a small farm nearby. Not only are the names determined to pursue her latest film project, she sees of the new arrivals Gemma and Charles Bovery, but Vilko, a con man who swindles celebrities, on a TV talk their behavior also seems to be inspired by Flaubert’s show. Interested in him for her new film, the two meet heroes. Based on the graphic novel written by Posy and Maud soon finds herself falling for Vilko’s Simmonds, which was originally published as a serial in manipulative charm as their symbiotic relationship The Guardian. hurdles out of control. Hippocrates Bande de filles (Girlhood) Thomas Lilti, dir | France | 2014 | 101m Céline Sciamma, dir | France | 2014 | 113m Cast: Vincent Lacoste, Reda Kateb, Jacques Gamblin Cast: Karidja Touré, Assa Sylla, Lindsay Karamoh FRIDAY, FEB 27 @ 4:30PM AND SUNDAY, MAR 1 @ 12NOON THURSDAY, FEB 26 @ 6:30PM AND FRIDAY, FEB 27 @ 6:30PM Though his first hospital rounds as an intern are Fed up with her abusive family situation, lack of school overwhelming, Benjamin is confident in his skills, prospects and the “boys’ law” in the neighborhood, especially because his father runs the ward he’s Marieme starts a new life after meeting a group of free- assigned to. But there’s a steep learning curve and spirited girls. She changes her name and her style, drops mistakes are made (and covered up). The pressure is out of school and starts stealing to be accepted into the compounded by the presence of Abdel, a seasoned gang. When her home situation becomes unbearable, doctor who is forced to play the role of an intern Marieme seeks solace in an older man who promises her because of his immigrant status. Their relationship is money and protection. Realizing this sort of lifestyle will fractious at first, but as Benjamin grows into his never result in the freedom and independence she truly position, he realizes there’s a lot more required to being desires, she finally decides to take matters into her own a doctor. More than a coming-of-age story, Hippocrates hands. is both a scathing indictment of the business of medicine and a heartfelt love letter to the doctors and nurses who La folie Almayer (Almayer’s Folly) toil thanklessly. , dir | Belgium/France | 2011 | 127m Cast: Stanislas Merhar, Marc Barbé, Aurora Marion La jalousie (Jealousy) SATURDAY, FEB 28 @ 6:30PM AND TUESDAY, MAR 3 @ 9PM Phillipe Garrel, dir | France | 2013 | 77m Cast: , Anna Mouglalis, Rebecca Convenant Opening with the extraordinary scene of a stabbing of a WEDNESDAY, FEB 25 @ 9PM AND SUNDAY, MAR 1 @ 6:30PM club performer lip-synching to Dean Martin’s “Sway,” Almayer’s Folly is Chantal Akerman’s loose adaptation of One of the major French filmmakers of the post-New Joseph Conrad’s first novel published in 1895. European Wave, has belatedly been recognized as trader Almayer lives deep in the Malaysian jungle a master in America, and Jealousy may be his most sometime during the 20th century, where he is slowly accessible film in nearly fifty years of filmmaking. The descending into madness as he obsesses over the film opens with a man leaving his wife and daughter welfare of his mixed-race daughter, Nina. Almayer’s Folly and, in a series of brief conversations, observed unfolds as something of a hallucinatory nightmare gestures, chance encounters and impulsive acts, tells the which, Akerman astutely intimates, might be the best story of the relationships that flounder and thrive in the way to describe the enduring legacy of colonialism. wake of this decision. In an autobiographical nod to his actor father’s abandonment of himself and his mother, the director casts his son and frequent star as the husband. Shot with Garrel’s celebrated sensitivity and attention to faces, bodies, hands and the intricacies of the human heart, Jealousy is an especially intimate, deeply poignant and never less than enthralling tale of love, temptation and betrayal.

Le jour se lève (Daybreak) Un rêve américain Marcel Carné, dir | France | 1939 | 93m Bruno Boulianne, dir | Canada | 2013 | 92m Cast: Jean Gabin, Jules Berry, Arletty Cast: Damien Robitaille SATURDAY, FEB 28 @ 2PM AND MONDAY, MAR 2 @ 4:30PM THURSDAY, FEB 26 @ 4:30PM AND MONDAY, MAR 2 @ 6:30PM This classic of French poetic realism stars Jean Gabin in Franco-Ontarian musician Damien Robitaille introduces one of his most famous roles as François, a rough, us to the extraordinary history of the people in the barrel-chested loner who hides out in his apartment United States of French Canadian heritage. Driving from waiting for the police to arrive. François has killed a Montréal to Los Angeles, winding his way through New man in a crime of passion, the slimy lothario Valentin. As England, New York, Michigan, the Midwest and the he listens in the darkness of his Normandy apartment to legendary Far West, he brings the milestone events of the police sirens closing in and getting louder, he recalls their exodus to life. He uncovers a paradoxical, almost the two women that he loved and the evil Valentin, who imaginary society dissolved into American life but still stole both their hearts and forced François into this very much alive. During his travels he meets all kinds of melancholy plight. The film was later re-made in engaging people and visits many places steeped in Hollywood as The Long Night. memory, and we begin to understand a multifaceted diaspora three centuries old and more than 12 million Level Five strong. An epic journey into the heart of America, where Chris Marker, dir | France | 1996 | 106m people of French Canadian descent, helped open the Cast: Catherine Belkhodja frontiers of the American Dream. THURSDAY, FEB 26 @ 9PM AND SATURDAY, FEB 28 @ 9:15PM Tante Hilda! Marker’s 1997 movie Level Five has only recently been Benoît Chieux, Jacques-Rémy Girerd, dir | France | 2013 released in the United States. It’s a fictional | 89m documentary examining the battle of Okinawa in World Cast: Sabine Azéma, Josiane Balasko, François Morel War II, a conflict that, by Marker’s lights, helped usher in SATURDAY, FEB 28 @ 12NOON AND SUNDAY, MAR 1 @ 4PM the atomic age in which we still live. Marker treats Okinawa through a fictionally contrived premise: the Animation. An inventive hand-drawn comedy that pits labors of Laura, a computer enthusiast and video game Aunt Hilda, who lives for her plants, against a powerful developer, as she tries to develop a strategy game based multinational company developing a new miracle plant on the battle—a cyber rewrite of history. Marker’s in its genetic laboratory. Aunt Hilda! is a turbulent and narrator lightly interrogates Laura, who keeps a video humorous blend of eco-thriller, family drama and love diary of sorts. story full of fantastical twists and turns, and is a warning to viewers about the dangers of messing with Québékoisie Mother Nature. Mélanie Carrier, Olivier Higgins, dir | Canada | 2014 | 81m Timbuktu Documentary Abderrahmane Sissako, dir | France/Mauritania | 2014 | SUNDAY, MAR 1 @ 2PM AND TUESDAY, MAR 3 @ 6:30PM 97m Cast: Ibrahim Ahmed, Abel Jafri, Toulou Kiki Documentary following the filmmakers as they cycle the SATURDAY, FEB 28 @ 4PM AND MONDAY, MAR 2 @ 9PM North Shore of Québec to better understand the complex relationships that exist between Aboriginal and Not far from the ancient Malian city of Timbuktu, now non-Aboriginal people. This quest for identity pushes ruled by the religious fundamentalists, cattle herder them to travel deep inside themselves and to faraway Kidane lives peacefully in the dunes with his wife, his lands. Their encounters, both planned and spontaneous, daughter and their twelve-year-old shepherd. In town, include the surprising tale of an Innu man in search of the people suffer, powerless, from the regime of terror his ancestors in Normandy, and the heart-wrenching imposed by the Jihadists determined to control their story of the sister of Corporal Marcel Lemay, who was faith. Music, laughter, cigarettes, even soccer have been killed during the 1990 Oka crisis. banned. The women have become shadows but resist with dignity. Every day, the new improvised courts issue tragic and absurd sentences. Kidane and his family are being spared the chaos that prevails in Timbuktu. But their destiny changes abruptly in this stunningly rendered film from a master of world cinema. 2015 Academy Award Nominee for Best Foreign Language Film.