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7 February 2020
Q&A with Gabrielle Stemmer, dir. Clean With Me (After Dark)
by Abla Kandalaft
Through a very clever and revealing video montage, Gabrielle Stemmer not only sheds light on somewhat depressing phenomenon of cleaning videos on YouTube but silently and subtly unearths the loneliness and neuroses that often underpin it, in a society in which women are homemakers and the home is their gilded cage.
How did you discover the “world” of YouTube?
I’ve been a heavy YouTube user for seven or eight years now – it’s TV for me. I’d say that from the beginning I’ve been watching stuff (...) Continue Reading »
At the crossroads of art and science, this film centers on human beings and robots as their artificial counterparts. Like a series of archival documents detailing the first contacts and exchanges between human beings and a robot, the film studies cognitive dissonance, a minuscule, mysterious relational space lying between them both.
A thoroughly exhaustive but at moments frankly alarming - the growth of emotional tech - look at our ever-changing relationships with robots. Yves Gellie’s (...) Continue Reading »
7 February 2020
Q&A with Mehdi Benallal, dir. Madame Baurès - Clermont 2020
by Abla Kandalaft
A stroll through the present-day municipalities of Vincennes and Saint Mandé, once home to Madame Baurès, a woman and Communist. The filmmaker’s voice-over recounts the memory of the story that Raymonde had entrusted to him. (Cinéma du Réel)
This is a very moving film about memory and legacy, as we are given a glimpse into Madame Baurès’s life as it is now, in a world that seems to have forgotten and openly turned its back on everything she spent most of her life fighting for. Through this (...) Continue Reading »
6 February 2020
Q&A with Ioseb “Soso” Bliadze, dir. Tradition - Clermont 2020
by Elise Loiseau
Two German tourists travel around Georgia and encounter the country’s culture, traditions and some more conservative attitudes.
A brave film in which the director’s passion for the subject and anger at the prejudices faced by many gay people in his home Country certainly come to the fore. An interesting and timely festival run, ahead of the general release of Georgian filmmaker Levan Akin’s And Then We Danced, a film centered on the growing feelings between two gay students of a Georgian (...) Continue Reading »
Logan is a sci-fi obsessed awkward teenager who often finds himself the butt of his friends’ jokes. One day, he’s visited by an older man who claims to be him, 39 years from now and asks him to join him on a mission to save humankind.
A sci-fi enthusiast himself, Noël Fuzellier’s passion for space travel and Mars in particular shines through this optimistic, unpretentious yet ambitious short. He deftly mixes low-key family dynamics typical of French cinema with zany space travel sequences. (...) Continue Reading »
Olla responded to an advertisement on an Eastern women dating site. She moves in with Pierre, who lives with his old mother. But nothing happens as planned.
First time director but seasoned actress Labed brings us a visually distinctive look at sexuality and modern relationships.
Trailer
More on the film...
Olla’s character is particularly interesting. Far from being a victim, she reinvents herself, constantly surprising the viewer. How did you create this character?
I wanted to make a (...) Continue Reading »
On the edge of the forest of Saint-Jean, near the village of Corte, nature has taken over the abandoned military base. Today, it is a place where families and sportsmen spend their time in relaxation, though in the 1970s it was the worst fear of the soldiers of the French Foreign Legion.
More on the film...
Where did you get the idea of making a film about this particular military prison that punishes disobedience and desertion?
Sometimes, a chance meeting upsets your plans. That’s what (...) Continue Reading »
Why does "Little Red Riding Hood" give Jamie nightmares? It’s been fifteen years, and the girl in the hallway still haunts him. This is a testament to locked doors. A lullaby sung by wolves with duct tape and polaroids. Not all girls make it out of the forest. There are stories children shouldn’t hear.
A remarkably effective, inventive and haunting animation about a real-life case of child abduction.
Trailer
More on the film...
How did this retelling come about?
I’m a big poetry fan, and (...) Continue Reading »
1 February 2020
Short of the Week: Nefta Football Club, dir. Yves Piat
by Abla Kandalaft
In a Tunisian village, children are playing football on a wasteland. Meanwhile, Abdallah and Mohammed come across a donkey with headphones on his ears and bags full of a white powder on his back. The two young brothers decide to bring those bags back to their village.
This amusing, sweet short film by Yves Piat received the audience prize at Clermont-Ferrand 2019 and has recently enjoyed both Cesar and Oscar nominations. Thanks to the Univers Cine team, you can now catch it online with (...) Continue Reading »
This sweet, topical short from director Daniel Marc Janes is both profound and poignant, masterfully touching on the English psyche from an outsider perspective. Shot in 16mm, the visually warm picture ends with a more succinct and intimate expression of Post-Brexit Britain than any insider knowledge could secure. It was showcased as part of the London Short Film Festival’s Visions of Albion event, which presented a formidable range of new shorts – each distinct in both theme and style but (...) Continue Reading »
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