11th New French Cinema Review

Forum cinema, 5 Legionowa Street
tickets: 13 PLN / movie, available at the Forum Cinema’s box office, Ludwik Zamenhof Center’s box office and on bilety.bok.bialystok.pl

July 10th
6:30 PM ARAB BLUES
8:30 PM DIVORCE CLUB

July 11th
11 AM SPREAD YOUR WINGS
6:30 PM FATHER AND SONS
8:30 PM WHITE AS SNOW

July 12th
10:15 AM DILLI IN PARIS
6:45 PM REBELS
8:45 PM HOW TO BE A GOOD WIFE

July 14th
6:30 PM REAL LOVE

July 15th
6:30 PM PERFECT NANNY

July 16th
6:30 PM #IAMHERE

Arab Blues
Selma, a psychoanalyst, deals with a cast of colourful new patients after returning home to Tunisia to open a practice.
In this sophisticated comedy, Manele Labidi opens a fascinating window into modern Tunisia at a crossroads, with a story of contrasts, contradictions and culture clashes, full of vitality and humour.

Divorce Club
Ben is devastated when his wife asks for a divorce. While everyone chooses her side, Ben comes across Patrick, an old friend from college, recently divorced. Patrick invites him to crash at his place. The two roommates are soon joined by other divorced, separated and single people looking for a refuge. Parties after parties, the villa becomes a VIP club where they can embrace their situation, feel free and have fun. The club has one sacred moto: no couple, no trouble. When Ben comes across Marion, things start to get complicated…

Spread your Wings
Classic father-and-son tensions get a thrilling, new lease of life thanks to the family adventure Spread Your Wings from director Nicolas Vanier (AF FFF18, The School of Life; AF FFF14, Belle and Sebastian).
Inspired by a true story, Spread Your Wings follows videogame-addicted teenager Thomas (Louis Vazquez) who is sent by his mother, Paola (Mélanie Doutey, AF FFF15, The Connection), to spend the school holidays with his father in the beautiful, yet secluded, wetlands of the Camargue region in Southern France. With no Wi-Fi and only his ornithologist father, Christian (JeanPaul Rouve, AF FFF19, Kiss & Tell; AF FFF18, C’est la vie!), for company, Thomas is slowly drawn into his father’s passion for a gaggle of newborn, wild geese. Together, father and son train the birds for their first migratory flight, hoping to free them from captivity. By doing so, they also start to rebuild their own strained relationship.
Revolving around this familial dynamic, Spread Your Wings gently echoes the broader international rise of young activists debating the future of a planet they are about to inherit. It is a beautiful film; a timely family adventure about how even the smallest gestures can have a huge impact.

Father and Sons
Joseph and his two sons, Joachim and Ivan, form a close-knit family but fail to see that each one is losing control of his life. Joachim is supposed to be studying psychiatry but spends most of his time daydreaming about his ex-girlfriend, Ivan cannot fit in at school despite being very smart, and Joseph has secretly quit his job as a doctor and is trying to become a writer. While there is plenty of affection at home, all three are also, clumsily, searching for love…

White as Snow
Claire, a beautiful young woman works at her late father’s hotel that is now managed by her evil stepmother Maud. Claire unwittingly sparks uncontrollable jealousy in Maud, whose young lover has fallen in love with Claire. Maud decides to get rid of Claire who finds shelter in a farm where she’s allowed to break free from her strict upbringing through encounters with seven “princes.”

Dilli in Paris
Travel to the upper reaches and lower depths of Paris in the Belle Epoque with Dilili, a graceful young girl with eagle-eyed smarts as she investigates the mysterious plot of the Master Men. Together with Orel, a delivery boy who ferries her around the sweeping photo-realistic and jewel-toned landscape as only expert animator Michel Ocelot could conceive, Dilili will stop at nothing until justice is restored. Our super sleuths journey through a turn-of-the-century world so evocative, you just might spot Picasso, Proust, or Marie Curie.

Rebels
Brought together by the accidental killing of their lecherous boss, fish-canning factory workers Sandra, Marilyn and Nadine discover a bag full of stolen cash on the dead man’s body. All three women desperately in need, they decide to steal the money and to get rid of his corpse – by canning it. What could have been a perfect plan quickly heads south when the gangsters to whom the loot belonged turn up, and the tins containing the remains of the dead boss are delivered to a charity for distribution.

How to Be a Good Wife
Maintaining a household and stoically submitting to conjugal duty are the skills Paulette Van Der Beck teaches with fervor in her homemakers institute. Her certainties are shaken when she finds herself widowed and ruined. Is she rattled by the return of her first love or the wind of freedom in May ’68? What if the good wife finally became a free woman?

Real Love
Mario, a man without much ambition, except for love, is back to square one after his wife left home. He now must raise on his own his two daughters going through their adolescent years while going through some sort of a teenage crisis of his own. Frida, 14-years old, blames her father for their mother’s absence and she develops ambivalent feelings towards her new girlfriend. Niki, 17-years old, will soon leave home. Until then, she lives the good life. Mario can’t help but lose the women he loves. Yet they must all agree to let one another go. Can accepting to lose someone eventually lead to finding oneself?

Perfect Nanny
A taut thriller built around the leap of faith it takes to invite a stranger into your home to care for your children, The Perfect Nanny is every parent’s nightmare. Adapted for the screen from Leïla Slimani’s Goncourt Prizewinning blockbuster 2016 novel of the same name, director Lucie Borleteau leads an electrifying narrative around family, motherhood and trust.
After spending many years as the primary carer of her two young children, Myriam has made the hard decision to return to her work as a lawyer. Despite her husband remaining unconvinced, Myriam decides that a nanny is the solution to their problems.
Almost instantly becoming a member of the family, Louise (Karin Viard) seems too good to be true. As events unravel, that might just be the case.
Playing an unusually dark role, so passionate was Karin Viard about the character of Louise that she acquired the rights to Slimani’s novel herself. Already a celebrated actress, this was the part she was born to play. Under Borleteau’s masterful direction and with a tight-knit cast as the family in crisis, it all comes together in a tense thriller like no other.

#Iamhere
Stéphane, a French head chef, has every reason to feel fulfilled. And yet, the only one that keeps him alive is Soo, a young Korean woman he met on lnstagram. They talk about art and cherry trees about to blossom and seem to understand each other despite the language, the distance and cultural barriers. On a whim, Stéphane decides to visit Soo in Seoul. Will he finally be able to meet her?