Pascale de Boysson Movies

In Roman Polanski's adaptation of Thomas Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles, Nastassja Kinski plays Tess, a poor British peasant girl sent to live with her distant and wealthy relatives, the D'Urbervilles. Though Tess' father had hoped that the girl would be permitted a portion of the D'Urberville riches, he is in for a major disappointment: Tess' new housemates are not D'Urbervilles at all, but a social-climbing family that has bought the name. Tess won three Oscars, including a "Best Cinematography" statuette for the late Geoffrey Unsworth and his successor Ghislain Cloquet. The film also served to catapult Nastassja Kinski to stardom. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

This French political thriller depicts the world of troubles that descend upon a relatively innocent doctor who decides to serve as a political candidate running against a thoroughly corrupt and devious mayor. In a recent campaign, the mayor and his henchmen were responsible for the murder of a man putting up posters for a rival candidate. Since the mayor is capable of arranging murder, it comes as little surprise that he arranges for the distribution of a forged photograph which makes it appears the doctor's wife was in an orgy. Attempts to clear his family's name and continue with the campaign make the doctor's situation worse. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

The Shameless Old Lady should have been a wry French satire of society's misconceptions about the elderly; alas, the film is defeated by its own preciousness. That irreplaceable Gallic character actress Sylvie was honored with her first starring film role as a newly widowed 70-year-old woman (the actress was 81 at the time). Having lived in sequestered squalor most of her life, Sylvie suddenly decides to venture into the modern world--and she loves it! She determines to have as much fun as possible in the few years left her, while those around her (those younger, that is), cluck their tongues at how this once miserly woman is squandering her life's savings. Sylvie alone makes The Shameless Old Lady worth watching; the screenplay, which rudely patronizes and stereotypes the elderly, is far more "shameless" than any old lady. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

This first-time directorial effort by Nico Papatakis is a disturbing satire with political overtones relative to a French-Algerian conflict that make the tale even more controversial. Two orphaned sisters, Michele and Marie (Francine Berge and Colette Regis) have been working as servants in a family for some time now. As the drama begins, the two sisters are tearing apart the house in the absence of the family. They rant and rave or just talk, slowly revealing that they have not been paid in a long time, and they are alternately either afraid or wildly elated. Then the family comes home -- and arguments take over with the sisters either fawning over the family, or antagonistic to them. The insane situation eventually reaches a crescendo when the two servants learn that the family plans on selling the house and perhaps leaving them in the lurch. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi