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Review: Declaration of War

A puzzler of a cancer drama
A baby with a brain tumor is no laughing matter.
By ALICIA POTTER | February 16, 2012

Astralwerks (2012)
It was inevitable that Air would one day be asked to soundtrack a colorized version of an iconic 1902 silent French film about moon exploration, right? There's the French thing, the moon thing, the kitsch-cool factor.
By ZETH LUNDY | January 31, 2012

Review: Charlotte Rampling: The Look

Angelina Maccarone's portrait of the actress
Rampling's physical gifts, unimpeded by plastic surgery in their march through time, are matched by a keen mind and an unapologetic approach to life and work.
By BETSY SHERMAN | January 31, 2012

Review: The best of the Ottawa International Animation Film Festival

Canadian animations
The Canadians produce the best animation programs and prove it again with this international selection.
By PEG ALOI | January 24, 2012

Review: Crazy Horse

Wiseman behind the scenes at a revered dance institution
In La Danse — The Paris Opera Ballet , Frederick Wiseman looked behind the scenes at a revered dance institution. In his new documentary he examines a dance institution of a different sort, the cabaret bar of the title, a Parisian pop-cultural icon and tourist mecca dedicated to artistically ambitious "nude chic" dancing.
By PETER KEOUGH | January 24, 2012

Review: Pina

Putting 3D to good use
Who could have predicted that it would take the surviving leading lights of the New German Cinema to put 3D to good use?
By ANN LEWINSON | January 18, 2012

Huntington pays tribute to God of Carnage

Parent flap
If Lord of the Flies wanted an upscale-urban bookend, it could do worse than God of Carnage (presented by the Huntington Theatre Company at the BU Theatre through February 5).
By CAROLYN CLAY | January 18, 2012

Review: The Artist

Michel Hazanavicius's flashback to '20s-era Hollywood
The advent of talking pictures sends a screen idol into both a career nosedive and an identity crisis in Michel Hazanavicius's flashback to Hollywood's transitional period of the late '20s.
By BETSY SHERMAN | December 20, 2011

Review: Weekend

Jean-Luc Godard's 1967 opus
Among the world's masterpieces of misanthropy, Jean-Luc Godard's 1967 opus follows a loathsome, greedy, sexually perverse bourgeois married couple on a weekend jaunt into the French countryside during which they plan to murder the wife's dying father, and then, perhaps, turn viciously on each other.
By GERALD PEARY | December 06, 2011

Review: Tomboy

Céline Sciamma's lovely feature
In this lovely feature from the French filmmaker Céline Sciamma, Laure, a 10-year-old tomboy decides after moving into a new neighborhood, to pretend that she's a boy, Mikael, as a way to fit in with the local kids.
By GERALD PEARY | November 29, 2011

Review: Le Havre

Aki Kaurismäki's effective minimalism
Few filmmakers practice minimalism as effectively as Aki Kaurismäki.
By PETER KEOUGH | November 08, 2011

Review: Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life

The life of Serge Gainsbourg
In this tour de force biopic, cartoonist-filmmaker Joann Sfar uses darkly comic fairy tale elements to illustrate Gainsbourg's creative process.
By BETSY SHERMAN | October 25, 2011

Review: The Women on the 6th Floor

A kind of European version of The Help
Philippe Le Guay's '60s-set Parisian upstairs/downstairs, a kind of European version of The Help , has all the ingredients necessary for US consumption: political correctness, platitudes, saucy comedy; and a romance between a middle-aged bourgeois reactionary and a life-affirming, left-leaning babe 30 years his junior.
By PETER KEOUGH | October 11, 2011

Review: Love Crime

A deconstruction of the mystery genre
Love Crime deconstructs the genre by showing how to put together a mystery in order to deceive and manipulate those who would try to take it apart.
By PETER KEOUGH | October 04, 2011

Review: My Afternoons with Margueritte

Twisting the "lonely child, clean old man" formula
European cinema doesn't have as many sure-fire formulas as Hollywood, but the one described, I think, by Pauline Kael as the "lonely child, clean old man" scenario has long endured.
By PETER KEOUGH | September 20, 2011

Review: Thames Street Kitchen

Getting more than the food right
There's a new restaurant in Newport that may very well give the expression "tsk-tsk" new, enthusiastic meaning.
By BILL RODRIGUEZ | September 20, 2011

Review: The Hedgehog

Mona Achache's adaptation of Muriel Barbery's best-seller
Eleven-year-old Paloma (Garance Le Guillemic) agrees, and plans to kill herself on her 12th birthday because she doesn't want to end up like the other members of her family — goldfish in a bowl.
By PETER KEOUGH | August 30, 2011

Review: Mysteries of Lisbon

Raúl Ruiz's legacy
Ruiz's gorgeous, painterly visuals are shot from startling angles and work alongside his precise, anarchic, and gleefully absurd narrative to evoke a heightened reality that plumbs the mysteries of life.
By PETER KEOUGH | August 23, 2011

Review: Senna

Chronicling Ayrton Senna's career
The story of Brazilian Formula One champion Ayrton Senna sounds, well, just like a movie — Le Mans , maybe, or Talladega Nights without the comedy.
By PETER KEOUGH | August 16, 2011

Review: The Names of Love

Softcore sex and politics
Child abuse, genocide — those French have a way with romantic comedies.
By PETER KEOUGH | August 16, 2011

Review: Café Zelda

A truly memorable experience
Café Zelda is one of those places that feels elegant but homey; luxurious but not pretentious.
By JOHNETTE RODRIGUEZ | August 09, 2011

Review: Point Blank

Diminishing returns
Samuel (Gilles Lellouche), a student nurse, gets sucked into a quagmire of murder and corruption when a thug kidnaps his pregnant wife, Nadia (Elena Anaya), to blackmail him into springing Hugo (Roschdy Zem), a wounded prisoner held by the police at the hospital where he works.
By PETER KEOUGH | August 09, 2011

Review: Sarah's Key

A compelling interplay of tensions
Sarah's Key is a superior "woman in the present becomes obsessed with woman in the past" narrative.
By BETSY SHERMAN | August 02, 2011

Review: La Rafle

The psyche of Hitler
In La Rafle , director Rose Bosch boldly tackles the psyche of Hitler, showing the Führer enjoying the high life with Eva Braun as he instructs his minions to pressure France to hand over its Jews so he can sate his genocidal bloodlust before the Allies fully catch on to his heinous mission.
By TOM MEEK | July 19, 2011

Review: Viva Riva!

A gritty get-down
One thing about Djo Tunda Wa Munga's plucky Third World noir: it never slows down.
By TOM MEEK | July 05, 2011

Review: L'amour Fou

Thoretton's portrait of the late Saint Laurent
Pierre Thoretton's lugubrious portrait of the late Yves Saint Laurent (he died in 2008) begins with a 2002 press conference in which the iconic designer announced his retirement from the world of fashion.
By PETER KEOUGH | May 26, 2011

Yelle | Safari Disco Club

Barclay Records (2011)
In the four years since French electro queen Yelle released her debut, Pop Up, a gaggle of comparable female dance-pop characters — from Gaga to La Roux to Robyn — have made their way into the spotlight.
By CARRIE BATTAN | March 31, 2011

Libya: Why Obama is right

What's wrong with saving lives?
That the nation is apprehensive and ambivalent about President Barack Obama's military intervention in Libya is natural, even healthy.
By EDITORIAL | March 31, 2011

Review: Hugo's

Midweek special gets top-notch gourmet food at neighborhood prices
For many years now the most memorable meals to be had in Portland have been at Hugo's.
By BRIAN DUFF | February 23, 2011

Review: Le Central

Cherchez la lunch
Their slogan is "Where the East Bay meets the Left Bank," and Le Central, in the middle of Bristol, usually does a fine job fulfilling the claim with more than good french fries. Gone are the days when the town had to settle for a Café La France on the spot.
By BILL RODRIGUEZ | February 15, 2011