Marie-Sophie L. Movies
- 2003
Coline Serreau's 18 Ans Apres (18 Years Later) is a sequel to her 1985 film Three Men and a Cradle, which was re-made in America as Three Men and a Baby. Marie (Madeleine Besson) is now on the verge of turning 18. She decides to spend a summer vacation with her mother Sylvia. Joining them are Sylvia's husband (Ken Samuels) and his two young adult boys (Gregoire Lavollay-Porter and James Thierree). Eventually her three "dads" (André Dussollier, Michel Boujenah, and Roland Giraud) and a housekeeper show up. The differences between Americans and the French, the foibles of single parenthood, and the pitfalls of middle-aged love and sex provide the material for the film's comedy. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- André Dussollier, Michel Boujenah, (more)
- 1993
After being driven over the edge by a collective series of romantic reverses, three working-class friends abandoned their ordinary jobs as a waiter, taxi-driver and hairdresser to milk money from tourists in a series of clever scams. They have been apprehended by the authorities and are awaiting trial before a judge who has been having an affair with their lawyer. Before this comedy is over, the judge, who previously had entertained a rather exalted view of his own good sense, will have a more sympathetic understanding of how ordinarily good men can go a little crazy and do some bad things - especially in response to crazy romantic situations. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Marie-Sophie L., Fabrice Luchini, (more)
- 1992
It is a commonplace that past actions affect our present circumstances. This ambitious movie attempts to show how truly distant actions from former lives affect the subsequent lives of the protagonists. In the story, beginning in Roman times, a wanderer (Gerard Lanvin) miraculously tames some wild bees for a group of lepers, who are killed shortly after that by Roman soldiers. In modern times, a group of gypsies enjoy their communal life, full of dancing and merriment, and have a strong affinity for horses. At the same time, a genial female con-artist (Beatrice Dalle) is putting her boyfriend on a plane. When a handsome gypsy (the wanderer in his former life) meets the con-artist (one of the lepers in her former life), it is love at first sight. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gérard Lanvin, Béatrice Dalle, (more)
- 1990
In this somewhat odd exploration of human romantic difficulties, the people in the film are all put under extra stress by the fact that on the day in question, they have lost an hour to daylight savings time. In addition, it is a full moon. Neither factor improves their response to the mild stresses they experience, which have been building up for several years. The beginning of the film shows a number of couples getting married, and follows them and a few others a few years later, on the day of the time change. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gérard Lanvin, Patrick Chesnais, (more)
- 1988
French director Claude Lelouch, of Man and a Woman fame, called the shots on Itineraire D'un Enfant Gate. Jean-Paul Belmondo (who co-produced the film) stars as a powerful international businessman who, in his youth, had been a carnival performer. Once more bitten by wanderlust, Sam Lion (Belmondo) tries to escape his responsibilities by staging his own death. Hiding out in Tanzania, Lion meets Abert Duvivier (Richard Anconina), one of his own employees. Duvivier, informing Lion that the business has gone to hell in a handbasket thanks to the mismanagement of Lion's daughter Victoria (Marie-Sophie Lelouch), begs the executive to return. The literal translation of the film's title is Itinerary of a Spoiled Child. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jean-Paul Belmondo, Richard Anconina, (more)
- 1986
Claude Lelouch's Bandits combines a murder story with a skewered view of "family values." Jewel thief Jean Yanne ships his daughter Marie-Sophie Lelouch off to a Swiss boarding school. His motives are not altogether paternal: Yanne intends to avenge the murder of his wife, and doesn't want his daughter around to complicate his plans. In Switzerland, Lelouch falls in love with a young criminal, and the cycle that has entrapped her father starts all over again. Nothing is what it seems and nothing that happens is what we expect in Bandits. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jean Yanne, Marie-Sophie L., (more)
- 1982
- R
Passion, a major film in Jean-Luc Godard's ongoing investigation of the relations between painting and cinema, uses innovative forms to explore political and economic questions. Jerzy Radziwilowicz plays a director shooting a film whose scenes are all reproductions of paintings by Goya, Valasquez, and other European masters. Production comes to a halt when his producers refuse to increase his budget until he explains the film's story to them. Meanwhile, the director is ending an affair with Hanna (Hanna Schygulla), the wife of Michel (Michel Piccoli), who is the manager of the hotel where the film's cast and crew are staying. In a sub-plot, Isabelle Huppert plays a factory worker who attempts to unionize her fellow employees. The story of Passion is elliptical and incomplete. It is a means of presenting a collection of scenes and images on related themes. This kind of story will become the hallmark of Godard's later career. The links among the episodes become even looser in such films as Germany: Year Nine Zero and For Ever Mozart. Passion marks the reunion of Godard with director of photography Raoul Coutard, who shot many of Godard's films of the 1960s. The cinematography is key to understanding this difficult film in which how an image is shot is as important as what it depicts. Godard and Coutard favor shots that begin as open, disorganized framings and become painterly compositions as the people and things in them move. ~ Louis Schwartz, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Hanna Schygulla, Michel Piccoli, (more)
