Jacques Alric Movies

A young Italian Communist couple come to grips with the fall of Italy's Communist Party and find themselves drifting apart in this Italian-French drama. As the Berlin Wall collapsed in the late '80s, so did the Italian Communist Party. In it's stead has come the more left-wing party the PDS. Since adolescence, Mario and Maria Boschi have been good communist party members. Now that the party is gone, they find themselves drifting apart; especially when Mario eagerly joins the new party while Maria remains a steadfast Communist. Maria soon finds herself drawn to Sicilian Communist Mario Della Rocca. He too is married, but when Maria's mate goes to a conference, she and the new Mario begin a romance. The experience of falling in and out of love makes Maria physically ill. She recuperates at her brother's house and subsequently makes love to the Sicilian. The months fly by. The three are all living alone as they reconcile their many problems. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

French filmmaker Diane Kurys directs the period drama Coup de Foudre (distributed in the U.S. as Entre Nous), adapted from a book she co-wrote with Olivier Cohen. The semi-autobiographical story is based on the life of the director's mother. Lena (Isabelle Huppert) is a Jewish refugee from Belgium living in occupied France during WWII. In order to avoid being sent to a German concentration camp, she agrees to marry the discharged military officer Michel (Guy Marchand). He tries to provide a decent life for her by running an auto repair business. They have two children together, but Lena is unhappy and stifled by her domestic life. Michel doesn't offer her the sensitivity and affection that she requires. Meanwhile, in Paris, the extroverted artist Madeleine (Miou-Miou) mourns the accidental death of her husband. After the liberation of France, she marries actor Costa (Jean-Pierre Bacri) and has children of her own. In 1952, Lena and Madeleine meet by chance in Lyons. The two women develop an emotional relationship that borders on romantic involvement. Their bond is only strengthened by a mutual dissatisfaction with their husbands, children, and home life in general. Entre Nous was nominated for the Best Foreign Film Oscar in 1983. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide

The analyst becomes the analyzed as filmmaker Alex Carti and screenwriter Georg Stefan Troller turn the theories of Dr. Sigmund Freud on the father of psycho-analysis himself to offer a fascinating look at one medical history's most controversial figures. From the anti-Semitic experiences of his childhood to his tenure studying the reproductive habits of eels at Vienna University, Freud's life is explored in minute detail to reveal just how his personal experiences may have influenced his groundbreaking but often contentious theories. As the relationship between Freud and such contemporaries as Charcot and Bruer begins to highlight the differences between the Parisian and Viennese schools of psychiatry, the origins of Freud's Studies in Hysteria slowly come into focus. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

At the beginning of World War II, while the Germans entered France from the north, many people had reason to believe that the Germans would not treat them kindly, and they fled by train to the south. This French film tells the story of a few of them. Because they were fleeing the best-organized bureaucrats in the world, many of them chose to flee in freight cars, unseen and unnoted. When Meyereu (Jean-Louis Trintignant) is separated from his wife during the escape, he allows a Jewish girl (Romy Schneider) to pose as his wife. As the deception continues, they come to care for each other, but she discreetly disappears when his real wife turns up. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide