Daniel Duval Movies

The loud, intense, and explosive action saga Banlieue 13: Ultimatum is a sequel to the 2004 European blockbuster Banlieue 13. This second installment was directed by Patrick Alessandrin but initially gestated from the vision of writer-producer Luc Besson, also responsible for scripting and producing the first go-round. Ultimatum unfurls three years after the original, in the slightly dystopian realm of suburban Paris, circa 2013. Ultra-violence now riddles that sphere -- to such a degree that cops have imposed a lockdown on the area, to little avail. Significantly, the neighborhood is also formally subdivided into ethnic enclaves, including Arabic, Asian, Caucasian, and African. As the tale opens, a crack team of rogue cops pulls off a police assassination inside of the district, prompting the police chief (Daniel Duval) to try to persuade the president (Philippe Torreton) to bulldoze the area and let the cops cash in on the turf's real estate value. In response, two of the said rogues, Damien (Cyril Raffaelli) and Leito (David Belle), hit the streets, guns blazing, and exude all of the force at their disposal to save the region from complete obliteration. ~ Nathan Southern, Rovi

Adapted from the same José Giovanni story that spawned Jean-Pierre Melville's classic 1966 film of the same name, director/screenwriter Alain Corneau's nail-biting thriller stars Daniel Auteuil as iconic French gangster Gustav "Gu" Minda and Monica Bellucci as the smoldering Manouche -- whose love for the notorious criminal knows no bounds. As the 1950s draw to a close, vicious convict Gu stages a daring escape from the prison where he had been serving a life sentence. Though Gu longs to flee from the country with his longtime lover Manouche, he must first complete one last job that will secure him the finances to do so; but with every policeman in the country currently searching for Gu, it isn't going to be easy. Gu has the fortitude and know-how of the most experienced criminal, and despite the fact that his staged hold-up goes down like clockwork, the police looking to capture him prove craftier than he ever anticipated. Inspector Blot (Michel Blanc) knows that Gu isn't likely to make any mistakes while procuring his funds for flight, so instead of trying to catch him in the act, he hatches an ingenious scheme to create dissent within the criminal ranks of his target. Blot's plan is to make Gu's gang think that their leader is now a police informer, and everyone buys the ruse except for Manouche. The steely-nerved Manouche knows Gu well enough to realize that he would never agree to work with the cops. Later, as things start to fall apart, Manouche prepares to pay the ultimate price to defend her beloved Gu and clear his name once and for all. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

A middle-aged man studying the Mur des Noms in modern-day France recalls the time 20 years prior when he and his mother were viewing the trial of Klaus Barbie with rapt attention in this introspective drama from director Amos Gitai. The year was 1987, and Rivka lived with her son, Victor, in a disheveled apartment littered with antiques and memorabilia. The opening session in the trial against the so-called "butcher of Lyon" is being televised, and Rivka is struggling to keep her emotions under control as she prepares dinner. Meanwhile, Victor sits in his office attempting to assemble his family tree. But he too is watching the trials, and doesn't seem to hear a word spoken to him by his secretary. As mother and son sit down for dinner together, the mere mention of Barbie's trial is enough to cause Rivka to excuse herself from the table. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

This French-language feature, starring and directed by the acclaimed blues maestro Richard Bohringer, was loosely adapted from the musician's roman-a-clef, and almost completely omits a central narrative. In it, a young writer pursues an idolized artist through the various experiences and exotic locales of his continual wanderings, from Paris to Mareille to Africa. Bohringer thus attempts to capture various moods and feelings, with a heavy emphasis on nocturnal events. ~ Nathan Southern, Rovi

Paranoia grips a bourgeois European family when a series of menacing videotapes begin turning up on their doorstep in Piano Teacher director Michael Haneke's dark drama. From the outside, Georges (Daniel Auteuil), Anne (Juliette Binoche), and son Pierrot (Lester Makedonsky) are the typical middle-class European family, but when a series of mysterious videotapes accompanied by morbid drawings reveal that someone has been monitoring their house, Georges begins to suspect that his past has come back to haunt him. It was during France's occupation of Algeria that Georges wronged a young Algerian boy named Majid (Maurice Bénichou), and as the enraged father and husband begins tracking down his former friend, the line between victim and predator becomes increasingly blurred. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

Filmmaker C.S. Leigh writes and directs his first feature film with the extreme drama The Process. French actress Béatrice Dalle plays an actress trying to kill herself. Through long, uncomfortable takes, the film explores her tortured existence. After a disastrous on-stage appearance with her estranged husband (Guillaume Depardieu), she engages in a rough sexual three-way with two men (Daniel Duval and Sebastien Viala). She also loses her child to a car accident and her breast to cancer. The Process was screened at the Berlin Film Festival in 2004 with live musical accompaniment by John Cale. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, Rovi

French superstar Catherine Deneuve stars in this downbeat drama about the fine line between love and need. Deneuve plays Hélène, an attractive but aging housewife who keeps a lover, a young artist named Paul (Xavier Beauvois). Hélène is strongly attracted to Paul, but isn't sure if he's interested in her mind, her body, or merely her checkbook. Paul, on the other hand, is attracted to Hélène, but finds her too clingy and possessive; he wants to get away, and sometimes uses heroin as a means of escape. One day, Paul meets Serge (Daniel Duval), a well-known artist Paul would like to work for some day. Paul learns Serge's story is a troubled one; he took part in the student uprisings of the May '68 General Strike, ended up in a mental hospital, and lost a wife to suicide. Le Vent de la Nuit (Night Wind) features an original score by John Cale, a founding member of the ground-breaking rock band the Velvet Underground. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Comedian Pierre Yves (stand-up comic Jackie Berroyer, who co-scripted) has an act based on his sexual hang-ups. With his adult son Arthur (Tara Romer), Pierre travels to his childhood hometown, drab industrial Lievin in northern France, for an all-night comedy festival. Fest staffer Monica (Karin Viard) takes him on a tour of the town, and he soon develops a fixation on her, making a play for her after learning her husband is in prison. Meanwhile, he has to deal with various interviews, receptions and eventually face an unresponsive audience. Shown at the 1998 Rotterdam Film Festival. Alternate title Whats So Funny About Me? ~ Bhob Stewart, Rovi

This harrowing film chronicles a few months in the life of a single mother (Dominique Reymond) of seven illegitimate children and her struggles on a French farm. Their father (Daniel Duval) owns the farm where the woman and kids live and work, but he lives with his legitimate family in town. He pays periodic visits to the farm and works the children hard. The mother thinks about leaving but doesn't know how she could start over. When the father isn't there, the children are playful and carefree. One day, the father comes on sexually to the oldest daughter, Jeanne (Jessica Martinez). Jeanne tells her mother about this, on Christmas Eve. The distraught mother agonizes over how to handle the situation. ~ Michael Betzold, Rovi

Based on the real-life assassination of a judge in Marseilles in 1981, this fictionalized account of how he came to die lacks the substance and drama that must have characterized the actual story as it happened. Judge François Müller (Jacques Perrin) was transferred from Vosges in northwest France to preside at the court in Marseilles, and when he arrives, he soon finds out what everyone else already knows: a certain Antoine Rocca (Daniel Duval) is the head of a large drug cartel centered in the city. The judge joins forces with a local police inspector, and manages to arrest Rocca for a short time for carrying an unlicensed weapon. Intent on eliminating the drug lord, Judge Müller goes to Palermo to search out evidence. With more dramatic build-up and an in-depth probing of the judge's own fears and motivations, this re-creation of a recent tragedy would have had more of an impact on audiences, especially in France where the details of the story were already known. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

In this run-of-the-mill thriller, a frenetic, sexually dysfunctional thief loses it and shoots two employees and his accomplices during a bank robbery then escapes to the Riviera. Once there, he gets a room in a hotel and takes a couple hostage -- he needs some sort of shield from the police while he makes his getaway. But the more he runs, the more it seems there is nowhere to turn. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

Director Claude Barrois based this crime thriller on an actual 1978 barroom massacre. When a yahoo criminal (Daniel Duval) offends a gangland don, the don hires a group of thugs to eliminate the lone upstart. The thugs invade the bar and shoot everyone in sight, but unfortunately their sole target escapes without a scratch. Furious at this attempt to kill him, the solitary criminal cons the head of the group of thugs to join him in fighting the don and his cohorts, and the slaughter escalates. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi