Vincent Cassel Movies
Alongside frequent collaborator Mathieu Kassovitz, Vincent Cassel emerged in the mid-1990s as one of France's most arresting and exciting new actors. Macho, hard-eyed, and appearing to be in constant preparation for a fight, Cassel embodied a kind of crude masculinity that recalled the likes of Jean-Paul Belmondo and served as a potent onscreen manifestation of the ever-tightening cultural tensions at work in late 20th century France. However, it is a testament to Cassel's talent that his onscreen persona has never verged into caricature, and thanks to his charisma and versatility, he has been able to work in films ranging from grim urban dramas to light romantic comedies.The son of celebrated actor Jean-Pierre Cassel, who made a career out of playing seductive bourgeois men, Cassel was born in Paris' Montmartre district on November 23, 1966. At the age of 17 he went to circus school and spent the next few years generally avoiding the acting scene, due in part to the fact that both his parents (his mother is a journalist) didn't want him to go into the movie business. Cassel was eventually sucked into films in 1991, when he landed a small role in Philippe de Broca's Les Clés du paradis. Two years later he enjoyed his first collaboration with Kassovitz in Metisse, an urban romantic comedy that cast Cassel as Kassovitz's older brother, a tough Jewish boxer.
Cassel again stepped in front of the camera for Kassovitz in L'Haine (1995), in which he played a rough-hewn Jewish kid roaming the mean streets of Paris in the company of two friends and a gun. The film was a surprise international success, winning a Best Director Award for Kassovitz at Cannes and a number of French Césars. For his part, Cassel received Best Actor and Most Promising Young Actor César nominations for his portrayal of a young man undone both by his own flaws and those of society, something that raised his profile considerably in his native country and abroad. The actor began popping up in such English language productions as Merchant-Ivory's Jefferson in Paris (1995) and as the leading man in a number of French films, including L'Appartement (1996), a romantic comedy in which he starred alongside Romane Bohringer, Jean-Philippe Ecoffey, and Monica Bellucci. Cassel and Bellucci would continue to collaborate onscreen (in such films as Come Mi Vuoi, 1996) and off, marrying in the late 1990s.
Cassel's CV grew rapidly as the century drew to a close, with the actor dividing his time between French films and such international productions as Elizabeth (1998), in which he played the mincing Duc d'Anjou, and Jez Butterworth's Birthday Girl (2000), a romantic drama that cast Cassel and Kassovitz as the cousins of an English bank clerk's (Ben Chaplin) Russian mail-order bride (Nicole Kidman). The following year Cassel recieved what was perhaps his biggest stateside exposure to date with the American release of the highly stylized kung-fu-horror-action-costume adventure flick Brotherhood of the Wolf. ~ Rebecca Flint Marx, All Movie Guide
With a plot more tangled than a spider's broken web, this French drama follows the romantic obsession of Max (Vincent Cassel), a young corporate hotshot who leaves his successful new world behind to search for his elusive lost love Lisa (Monica Bellucci). His mad quest begins after he accidentally overhears Lisa's melodic voice speaking in the phone booth next door. But before he knows it she is gone. Still, he is so elated that he abandons his plans, lies to his fiancee, and after leaving his luggage with his pal Lucien (Jean-Philippe Ecoffey), sets off to find her. The hunt leads to a fabulous apartment, where he saves a girl from a suicide thinking that she is Lisa. But this girl, Alice (Romane Bohringer) is as drab and mousy as Max's Lisa is beautifully feline. Max becomes involved with Alice, unaware that she also dates Lucien. Meanwhile the real Lisa attempts to break free from her obsessive rich lover who may have murdered his wife. For this reason, she continues to avoid her apartment, which she has generously loaned to Alice. When these characters collide, the stage is set for a tragic denouement. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Romane Bohringer, Vincent Cassel, (more)
- 1996
A childhood friendship becomes something much more in this Italian outing that begins as an off-beat comedy and ends up an exploration of a rocky romance. The story begins near the Baths of Carcalla in Rome where transvestite streetwalker Desideria hangs around begging for someone to love him/her and only ends up robbed and alone. The baths are a notorious hang-out for hookers and one night the police raid the joint causing Desideria to panic and flee with a cop in hot pursuit. Both end up hanging from a precipice and while waiting to be rescued, discover that they were best friends in school. Later Pasquale, the cop, returns to his provincial home village to consult a priest about what Desideria has become. The well-meaning father suggests that Pasquale help Desideria find redemption and resume life as a heterosexual. Unfortunately, things don't go as planned and Desideria ends up seducing Pasquale. They become lovers but trouble ensues when Pasquale's narrow-minded small-town lover Nellina finds out and tries to fight for his love. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1996
Based on a story by Henry James and set in the late 19th century, this complex and irony-laced French costume drama chronicles the convoluted relationship between young Morgan and his highly intelligent tutor Julien. When the 25-year-old Julien is first hired, teen-aged Morgan objects. A power struggle ensues until eventually student and teacher earn each other's grudging respect. The struggle causes a bitter awakening for both Julien, who loses much of his child-like innocence and the more worldly Morgan who has reveled in the false notion of his family's wealth and moral superiority. The truth, that his clan is both morally and financially bankrupt, is devastating to Morgan. Ten years quickly pass and the family is next seen trying desperately to retain its upper-class dignity and lifestyle in Russia. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Vincent Cassel, Caroline Cellier, (more)
While to most outsiders Paris seems the very picture of beauty and civility, France has had a long and unfortunate history of intolerance toward outsiders, and this powerful drama from filmmaker Mathieu Kassovitz takes an unblinking look at a racially diverse group of young people trapped in the Parisian economic and social underclass. Vinz (Vincent Cassel), who is Jewish, Hubert (Hubert Kounde), who is Black, and Said (Said Taghmaoui), who is Arabic, are young men from the lower rungs of the French economic ladder; they have no jobs, few prospects, and no productive way to spend their time. They hang out and wander the streets as a way of filling their days and are sometimes caught up in frequent skirmishes between the police and other disaffected youth. One day, a street riot breaks out after police seriously injure an Arab student; the three friends are arrested and questioned, and it is learned that a policeman lost a gun in the chaos. However, what they don't know is that Vinz picked it up and has it in his possession, and when Vinz, Hubert, and Said get into a scuffle with a group of racist skinheads, the circumstances seem poised for tragedy. Actress Jodie Foster was so impressed with La Haine when she saw it at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival that she helped to arrange American distribution for the film through her production company, Egg Pictures. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Vincent Cassel, Hubert Kounde, (more)
- 1995
Three French women in their 20s wrestle with their feelings about the nature of romance in this drama that chronicles their love lives over a 6 month period. The film opens with scenes that not only introduce the women, they also tell the viewer what is to become of two of them. Marie, who likes having sex with different partners, is a stockbroker. She is first seen climbing a huge tree to tell a portly office messenger of her love for him. Jeanne is married and works as a waitress. She finds her estranged husband in a restaurant. Alice, an art history student, is frigid and has low self-esteem because her father was domineering. She is first seen lying nude on a canvas. An artist pours paint upon her body. The film jumps back six months. The three women are at a local pool engaging in some post work-out girl talk. It is frank, graphic and quite sexual. Sex scenes illustrate their stories. Marie keeps sleeping around while Jeanne becomes a part-time hooker. Alice considers giving herself to a painter who creates tableaux of ecstatic naked women covered in paint. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Marine Delterme, Florence Thomassin, (more)
Best known for their historical epics that examine class and social issues in British life through a thick lens of tasteful production design and good manners, director James Ivory and producer Ismail Merchant set their sights on an American protagonist for a change with Jefferson in Paris. As the title suggests, Jefferson in Paris deals with the five years that Thomas Jefferson (Nick Nolte) spent as U.S. ambassador to France prior to the French Revolution; while Jefferson is sympathetic to the revolutionary forces in France, he's become well enough acquainted with the ruling aristocracy that he finds himself torn between the two sides of the issue. Jefferson, a recent widower, also becomes friends with Maria Cosway (Greta Scacchi), who is married to a foppish British artist; while it's obvious the two are in love, neither is in a position to do anything about their infatuation. And while Jefferson's daughter Patsy (Gwyneth Paltrow) loves her father, she's very upset with him when he sends her to a convent school. In this midst of this personal turmoil, Jefferson's younger daughter Polly (Estelle Eonnet) arrives in Paris, with her slave Sally Hemmings (Thandie Newton) in tow. Attractive and bright (if uneducated), Sally catches Jefferson's eye, and a friendship develops that grows into something deeper; in time, Sally becomes pregnant, and her family claims that Jefferson is the father. At the time Jefferson In Paris was released, the question of Sally Hemmings' relationship with Thomas Jefferson was a matter of lively historical debate; since then, genetic evidence has shown that, while Jefferson's paternity can't be proved beyond a doubt, it is likely that he did father children with Hemmings. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Nick Nolte, Greta Scacchi, (more)
- 1995
This French farce chronicles one special day in the lives of a married pair of Parisian architects, Fabienne and Bruno, as they anxiously await the results of an important architectual contest they have entered. Unable to handle the stress of waiting, both turn to sexual liason's to ease their tension. Bruno ends up enacting a dark sexual fantasy with a stranger while Fabienne eventually succumbs to the advances of Bruno's friend Simon, a fortyish Lebanese businessman and part-time drug dealer. The comedy takes on overtones of psycho-drama when the contest winner announced and the couple discovers the truth of each other's actions. A cache of drugs, discovered in an apartment only adds to their troubles. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Richard Berry, Karin Viard, (more)
A Caribbean beauty living in Paris wraps two very different but equally devoted men around her little figure when she announces that one of them is the father of her baby. Both Felix, a poor Jewish bicycle messenger boy, and Jamal, the genteel son of African Muslim diplomats, are in love with her and so become ardent rivals for Lola's affection. This frenetic comedy is the directorial debut of Mathieu Kassovitz, who also plays the role of Felix. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Julie Mauduech, Hubert Kounde, (more)
- 1992
- PG
Bo Derek stars as B.J. Cassidy, a Texas millionaire out to take over a French chocolate production company who instead finds romance with the factory's owner (Robert Hays). ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Bo Derek, Robert Hays, (more)
