Anne Fontaine Movies
- 2009
An untrusting wife attempts to prove that her husband is cheating by hiring an escort to seduce him, inadvertently endangering her entire family in the process. Julianne Moore, Liam Neeson and Amanda Seyfried star in a thriller written by Erin Cressida Wilson, and directed by Atom Egoyan (The Sweet Hereafter, Ararat). ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- 2009
- PG13
- Add Coco Before Chanel to Queue
Amélie and The Da Vinci Code star Audrey Tautou stars as legendary fashion designer Coco Chanel in this biopic penned by director Anne Fontaine and screenwriter Camille Fontaine in collaboration with Christopher Hampton. Based on the Chanel biography L'Irrégulière (The Nonconformist) by author Edmonde Charles-Roux, Coco Avant Chanel features dresses from the Chanel collection. House of Chanel art director Karl Lagerfeld also steps onboard to supervise the creation of accessories and costumes. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Audrey Tautou, Benoît Poelvoorde, (more)
A bodyguard hired to look after a lawyer ends up protecting the man from himself in this breezy comedy from France. Bertrand Beauvois (Fabrice Luchini) is a successful fiftysomething attorney who's hired to represent Edith Lasalle (Stéphane Audran), who has been charged with killing a man with ties to the Russian mafia. Edith's adult son, Louis (Gilles Cohen), has been warned that Russian strong-arm men may try to silence his mother and her legal team, so he hires a private security team to protect them and Bertrand finds he's shadowed at all times by stone-faced Christophe Abadi (Roschdy Zem). Bertrand doesn't see the need for Christophe's presence, but when the lawyer has trouble brushing off a former girlfriend he'd rather not see, the bodyguard turns out to be a valuable ally. Bertrand and Christophe strike up a friendship, as the former is increasingly impressed with the latter's street smarts and good judgment, but when Audrey Varela (Louise Bourgoin), a gorgeous woman nearly half Bertrand's age, begins throwing herself at him, Christophe has a hard time convincing his client that something is clearly not right. La Fille de Monaco (aka The Girl From Monaco) received its North American premiere at the 2008 Toronto Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Fabrice Luchini, Roschdy Zem, (more)
- 2006
Augustin Dos Santos, the cheerfully eccentric struggling actor played by Jean-Chretien Sibertin-Blanc in Augustin and Augustin, Roi du King-Fu, returns to the screen in this comedy from France. Augustin brings his one man show to a retirement home, where he learns one of the residents is Odette St. Gilles (Danielle Darrieux), who was a noted singer and actress in her youth. Despite her advanced age, Odette is as alert as ever, and she expresses great admiration for Augustin's performance. A few days after the show, Augustin wrangles a commission from French representatives of a Swedish glass-making concern to provide entertainment during a visit from the home office's top brass. Augustin has been asked to whip up a show that's "typically French," and when he decides his own material doesn't quite fit the description, he asks Odette for help. Odette suggests they stage an adaptation of the correspondence between Madame du Deffand and Julie de Lespinasse, and Augustin agrees, hiring out-of-work television actress Bettina Fleischer (Arielle Dombasle) as Odette's co-star and half-bright thug Franck (Christophe Vandevelde) as their love interest. However, it doesn't take long for Augustin to discover working with Odette is more of a challenge than he expected. Oh La La! (aka Nouvelle Chance) received its world premiere at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Danielle Darrieux, Arielle Dombasle, (more)
A middle-aged woman fears that her husband is cheating on her -- and chooses a very unlikely method for verifying her paranoia -- in this psychological drama from the writer of Une Liaison Pornographique. Catherine (Fanny Ardant) is a successful Parisian gynecologist whose long-term marriage to Bernard (Gérard Depardieu) has been passionless as of late. When she checks his cell phone messages one afternoon, she discovers a suggestive "thank you" from a young colleague of his, which creates an even wider chasm between the two. Desperate, Catherine goes to an upscale strip club nearby to solicit the services of Nathalie (Emmanuelle Béart), a matter-of-fact prostitute. It seems Catherine wants Nathalie to seduce Bernard and report back to her each week, an assignment that's initially off-putting to the young woman, but one she begins to relish as the weeks pass. Soon, Nathalie is using intimate details to fuel Catherine's rage toward her husband. Nathalie... had its gala North American premiere at the 2003 Toronto Film Festival. ~ Michael Hastings, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Fanny Ardant, Emmanuelle Béart, (more)
When the grown-up children of a missing parent are reunited with their father, they discover it raises more questions than it answers in a well-crafted mood piece from writer/director Anne Fontaine. Jean-Luc (Charles Berling) is a well-to-do physician whose practice is devoted to older patients, many of whom are forced to confront their fears about death. While Jean-Luc is used to dealing with such issues, they come home for him one day when he learns that his father has died. The news prompts Jean-Luc to look back at his younger days, and his difficult relationship with his dad, Maurice (Michel Bouquet), who ran out on his family when Jean-Luc was a boy and returned after he'd grown to adulthood with few explanations about where he'd gone (he became a volunteer physician in the Third World) and why he left his wife and children behind. Growing up in an air of uncertainty has had an impact on Jean-Luc's relationship with his wife Isa (Natacha Regnier); neither is certain of how to reach out to one another, and Jean-Luc sometimes seeks comfort in the arms of Myriem (Amira Casar), an assistant in his office. Maurice's absence also took its toll on Jean-Luc's brother, Patrick (Stephane Guillon), who deals with his anxieties by pursuing a career as a comic, while earning his keep as Jean-Luc's driver. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Michel Bouquet, Charles Berling, (more)
- 1997
This French-Spanish drama depicts a flat marriage that picks up a few new wrinkles. Nicole (Miou-Miou) and Jean-Marie Kunstler (Charles Berling) have run their small-town dry-cleaning shop for 15 years. When they visit a local night club, they see the brother-sister act of Loic (Stanislas Merhar) and Marilyn (Mathilde Seigner), who perform under the name Queens of the Night, and the four soon become friends. Later, the Kuntslers visit Basel, Switzerland, where the siblings are appearing. They learn the team is splitting up and invite the bisexual Loic to help at their shop. He accepts, and his presence alters their outlook on life. Shown at the 1997 Venice and Toronto film festivals. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Miou-Miou, Charles Berling, (more)
Different aspects of homosexual romance are explored in this compendium of short vignettes. The film is designed as sort of a gay version of 1994's 3,000 Scenarios to Combat a Virus, an anthology that was comprised of 30 short films -- made by some of France's best directors -- out of story ideas submitted by school children on ways to deal with the AIDS virus. In this film however, the selection committee had no age limit and received about a thousand potential stories. The ten selected vignettes (three of which do not deal with AIDS at all ) encompass a broad look at the subject and range for the tale of a lesbian teen trying to come out to her parents, to a gay man who shocks his lover by claiming to be pregnant, to another man's reminiscence of a brief affair with an HIV-positive man. The vignettes were originally shown individually on French television. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Pierre Salvadori, Paul Vecchiali, (more)
- 1995
In this interestingly amiable French comedy, a stuttering would-be actor with a nervous tic auditions for a variety of film jobs ranging from parts in industrial films, to commercials. The overly earnest fellow has no idea that those he comes in contact with find him hilarious but are too kind-hearted to tell him the truth. When the fellow is not auditioning, he is taking mind-numbingly dull claims for clients at an insurance agency. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stephanie Zhang
- 1992
Zina (Nora) is the French-born child of a North African immigrant. She is mightily self-centered, in the manner of a spoiled child: at one point she declares that "the love of my life is me." Despite this, two men are vying for her affections. One of them is the leading man (Alain Fromager) in acting company where Zina is an usherette. The other (Sami Bouajila) is a child of immigrants like herself, and is studying law while driving a cab to make ends meet. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Alain Fromager, Sami Bouajila, (more)
- 1985
Four inventive teachers at a normal French high school act up and act out some of their imaginative ploys to either help kids learn, or to undermine the opposition to their unorthodox teaching. Frederic (Patrick Bruel), Michel (Fabrice Luchini), Gerard Laurent Gamelon), and Francis (Christophe Bourseiller) try valiantly to get their students to hit the books, but their tactics are not always appreciated -- and may seem a little trite to viewers who have been around that block before. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Patrick Bruel, Fabrice Luchini, (more)
