Courtesy of Film Movement
2 Autumns 3 Winters
France was one of the birthplaces of the motion picture, and from early on, film was regarded not merely as a sideshow or even an industry, but as a facet of the nation’s culture. It was deemed an art form worthy of consideration alongside painting and poetry. Milwaukee’s 18th Annual Festival of Films in French is a tribute to that cinema culture and its offshoots in the French-speaking world. The two-week event is a setting for contemporary movies in many styles, including drama, comedy, animation and documentaries, along with nods to the past with films from the 1920s and ’30s.
“The first challenge in organizing the Festival of Films in French is the huge number of films to choose from,” says the event’s new director, Fabienne Bullot, a professor of French literature at UW-Milwaukee. “In 2013, over 200 films were produced in France alone.”
“Were going for things that don’t normally get shown in Milwaukee theaters,” adds Richard Stone, the festival’s longtime sponsor. “We’re programming thoughtful film—often of a kind that seldom get made in the U.S.
Comedy often has trouble crossing borders of language, but at least one of the festival’s selections makes the journey successfully. In 2 Autumns 3 Winters (2 Automnes 3 Hivers), a pair of unsettled and lonely people, sharing an anxiety over turning 30, run into each other—literally—while jogging. Director Sébastien Betbeder plays with time and recollection as romance takes an unsteady course across many digressions.
The Last of the Unjust
Courtesy of Cohen Media Group
Sounding a more serious note, the director who brought the word “Shoah” into the world’s vocabulary returns with another Holocaust documentary, The Last of the Unjust. Claude Lanzmann visits Theresienstadt, the “model city” established by the Nazis as a false front for genocide. A short train ride from Prague, Theresienstadt was shown in German propaganda (Lanzmann uses footage from a Nazi newsreel) as a productive, self-sustaining community where arts and education flourished, children were happy and well-fed and able-bodied adults worked in clean, well-lighted factories. Much of Last of the Unjust is devoted to Lanzmann’s provocative 1975 interview with Rabbi Benjamin Murmelstein, head of the Jewish Council that administered the camp under their Nazi overlords. An erudite man referencing Eurydice and Scheherazade, history and folklore, Murmelstein describes himself as a marionette sometimes able to tug against the wires.
Other highlights from this year’s festival include On My Way (Elle s’en va), a 2013 film starring Catherine Deneuve; Ernest & Celestine, a 2012 animated feature with an international cast of voices; and a pair of documentaries on contemporary French hip-hop and youth subcultures, Pleasure to the People (Faire kifer les anges) and 93 Beautiful Rebel (93 La Belle Rebelle) with talkback from director Jean-Pierre Thorn after the screening.
On My Way
Courtesy of Cohen Media Group
All films will be screened at the UWM Union Theatre, 2200 E. Kenwood Blvd. Admission is free. For more information, visit uwm.edu/french-film-festival/.
