VINGT Paris Magazine

L'illusionniste

Text: Aidan Mac Guill

If you have a spare 80 minutes this week you could do worse than sit down in a dark cinema and enjoy 'L'illusionniste', the latest film from the brilliant French animator and director Sylvain Chomet.

Chomet is best known as the creator of the Oscar-nominated 'Les Triplettes De Belleville' (or 'Belleville Rendez-vous' as it was released in Britain & Ireland), his retro tale of mobsters, mothers and the Tour de France. 'L'illusionniste', based on a Jacques Tati story, is set in the late-fifties. Tatischeff (Tati's original surname) is a French magician struggling to earn a living, and maintain his dignity, in an era that has moved on from vaudeville and the music-hall.

He is invited to travel to a remote Scottish island, to perform at a party celebrating the arrival of electricity to the community. There he is granted a hero's welcome, and encounters Alice, a young girl who believes Tatischeff to be truly magical. In this curious outsider she spots an opportunity to escape her old-fashioned hometown and experience life in the big city.

Cinema En Plein Air 2010

Text: Aidan Mac Guill
Image: DR

The perennially popular Cinema En Plein Air has returned to the Parc De Villette, films will be projected onto a gigantic inflatable screen every night until the 22nd of August. The films are shown in their original language, with French subtitles, and start when the sun goes down. It's advisable to pack a picnic and get there early to guarantee some leg-room for the feature presentation. All screenings are free but a €7 deposit is required if you want to rent a deck-chair. The festival is in it's 20th incarnation, reflected in this year's theme - 'Being 20'. All the films revolve around the promise and frustration of youth in some way. That being said not all youth will be welcome - this is the first year age restrictions will apply to some screenings. Having endured an uncomfortable couple of minutes last year sitting next to a 5 year old child while watching a naked Viggo Mortensen stabbing another man in the eye during 'Eastern Promises', this writer cautiously welcomes the decision.

Tournée (On Tour)

Text: Eli Bartlow Martin  Burlesque is at the core of French comic actor's Matthieu Amalric's latest film, Tournée (On Tour). Amalric plays Joachim, a middle-aged Frenchman and former television producer who abandons his children to start a new existence in America. But he returns with a troupe of Burlesque stars, whom he has tempted with a tour of France and Paris.

Going from town to town, the shows prove a wild success with men and women alike until, that is, trouble begins...

Tournée is inspired by real-life the New Burlesque genre, intended as a revival of the classic shows of the 1920's and 30's, when burlesque was about much more than a striptease. Satire and social commentary played an integral role. 

All of the actresses film's performers are real-life Burlesque artists who have pioneered the resurgence of the industry in America. 

Joseph Strick 1923-2010

Text: Aidan Mac Guill
Image: BFI

Joseph Strick died in Paris this month.  Screen-writer, director, producer and bete noire of censors, he emerged alongside contemporaries like Shirley Clarke and John Cassavetes as part of the American New Wave in the 1950s.

Having served as a cameraman in the Army Air Forces during World War II, his first film was 'Muscle Beach' in 1948, a documentary dealing with body-builders in California. In 1959, along with Ben Maddow and Sidney Meyers, he produced and directed 'The Savage Eye', a drama filmed in a verite documentary style. This landmark of film-making, a satire on the effects of consumerism in American culture and morality, won him a BAFTA Flaherty Documentary Award.

Festival Paris Cinema from 3rd July

Text: Aidan Mac Guill 

Image: Paris Cinema

From the 3rd to the 13th of July the Paris Cinema International Film Festival will be taking over the city for your audio-visual delectation. This year there is a particular focus on Japanese cinema, with around 100 Japanese films being screened throughout Paris. The majority of screenings will be at the recession-friendly price of €5. Special guests of the festival will be the actress, activist and Francophile Jane Fonda, the French-American writer & director Eugene Green, divisive Indian-American writer and director M. Night Shyamalan and the almost offensively good-looking French actor and director Louis Garrel, son of the great Philippe Garrel .

Recap Of International Critic's Week

Text: Aidan Mac Guill
Image: Lea Seydoux, Belle Epine

From Thursday to Sunday the Cinémathèque Française will be showing the 14 short and feature-length films which were in competition at the International Critic's Week at Cannes. On Thursday night Rebecca Zlotowski will introduce her film 'Belle Epine' alongside its star Lea Seydoux (who some unlucky readers may have spotted in Ridley Scott's recent 'Robin Hood' film).

Also showing over the weekend will be 'Armadillo', Janus Metz's controversial documentary about Danish soldiers in Afghanistan. The film, which took the Grand Prize at Cannes, has already prompted a government inquiry into the behaviour of Danish troops in Metz's native Denmark. Each film will be preceded by a short film from competition, which this year was won by Daniel Joseph Borgman's 'Berik', set in a small village in Kazakhstan situated in the shadow of a nuclear plant. There will also be special screenings of short films that were not in competition. A complete programme is available here.

Louxor - Palais Du Cinema to re-open in Barbès

Text & Image: Aidan Mac Guill

On the corner of Boulevard de la Chapelle and Boulevard de Magenta, at the heart of noisy, relentless Barbès, stands a building. Amidst the clatter of the overground metro and the chatter of the traders lining the market below, and the unnatural din that emanates from the bazaars, cafes, stalls and kebab shops, and endless crowds of passers-by, the quiet of this battered monument is remarkable. No trace of its former glory remains, seemingly, until the sun breaks through the April storm clouds and lights up the golden tiles of a faded Egyptian facade. Floral scarabs and cobras lead the eye past a giant winged disc above the entrance to the relief on its far side, which reads, in magnificent art-deco lettering 'LOUXOR - PALAIS DU CINEMA'.    

Designed by the architect Henry Zipcy, the Louxor first opened its doors on October 6, 1921, more than a decade before Le Grand Rex in the 2nd or La Cigale in the 18th. Inspired by the archaeological discoveries making headlines in the French press at the time, the flagship cinema of the Pathé chain was built in an Egyptian art-deco style. The facade outside was mirrored inside by murals depicting Egyptian scenes, hieroglyphics, plants and papyrus leaves. Two balconies overlooked the seats, orchestra pit and stage below. Its curious appeal made the cinema popular in early years. 

Cannes 2010 - Director's Fornight - Staff Benda Bilili

 Text: Cineuropa

Joie de vivre and the emergence of artistic talent irrespective of world location were the keynotes at the opening of the Directors’ Fortnight, which today unveiled Renaud Barre and Florent de la Tullaye’s outstanding documentary Benda Bilili! Retracing the incredible rise to fame of a group of paraplegic musicians from Kinshasa (in the Democratic Republic of Congo), the film plunges viewers into a moving human adventure with irresistible rhythm and a fascinating journey into the depths of Africa.  See VINGT Paris' review of their gig in December 2009 at Cafe de la Danse in Paris.

Everything starts in 2005 in Kinshasa, a city notorious among the press for being a dangerous filming location ("here, it’s the jungle, the law of the strongest”). While filming a documentary about urban music, two French directors meet the band Staff Benda Bilili and its frontman Ricky. These handicapped musicians live in total poverty, but are driven by an energy, optimism and unfailing generosity, which they continually express in song: "A man is never finished, luck arrives unexpectedly, I used to sleep on cardboard boxes, bingo, I have a mattress!"

The United Nations Traveling Film Festival at the Arts Arena

Image: Garbage Dreams

The United Nations Association Film Festival and its Traveling Film Festival celebrate the power of films and videos dealing with human rights, the environment, globalization, war and peace. In the last 12 years, UNAFF-selected films have included 15 that received Oscar nominations and five that won the Academy Award for Best Documentary. The Arts Arena has chosen five UNAFF films to be screened and discussed by distinguished panelists around the topic of FACES: Who are we? Who’s in charge? What do you do when the war ends? What do we do when the movie’s over?

The festival will begin on Saturday May 8, at 5pm with a cycled called Urban Faces. It will open with screening of Megalopolis by  Francesco Conversano, Nene Grignaffini, a stunningly filmed exploration of six of the worlds's largest cities that draws on the science fiction of the past. After an open panel discussion and drinks, a different image of the urban life will be presented with Garbage Dreams by Mai Iskander, a story of three boys born into the trash trade in the world's largest garbage village, a ghetto on the outskirts of Cairo and home to the Zaballeen, 'garbage people.'

Cannes 2010 Twelve European Films in Directors' Fortnight

Text: Fabien Lemercier, Cineuropa

With the emphasis on discovering new talents, the 42nd Directors’ Fortnight, which will run from May 13-23 at the 63rd Cannes Film Festival, unveiled its selection at midday today in Paris. It offers a rich line-up of 21 world premieres (a record) and 11 debut films among the 22 features in the main programme. European cinema takes pride of place with 12 titles (by directors from France, Belgium, Italy, Spain, the UK, Denmark, Switzerland and Germany) and two co-productions selected by the new delegate general, Frédéric Boyer.

Belgium is represented by two titles: Olivier Masset-Depasse’s Illegal (co-produced by Luxembourg and France); and Gust Vanderberghe’s Little Baby Jesus of Flanders. Meanwhile, Italy will be hoping for success with Michelangelo Frammartino’s The Four Times (co-produced by Germany and Switzerland); Spain with Oliver Laxe’s Todos Vos Sodés Capitans; Germany with Philip Koch’s Picco; and Denmark with Christoffer Boe’s Everything Will Be Fine (co-produced by Sweden and France). The line-up also includes UK director Alicia Duffy’s Irish/Belgian/French co-production All Good Children and Swiss filmmaker Jean-Stéphane Bron’s documentary Cleveland Vs. Wall Street (produced by France).