Jean-Pierre Kalfon Movies

This homage to the cinema by venerated movie-maker Agnes Varda, often dubbed the "grandmother" of the French New Wave, features an all-star international cast. The story is based upon the memories and insights of the 100-year old Mr. Simon Cinema. He lives in a magnificent house filled with movie memorabilia. To help him remember the important details of his career he hires Camille, a film student to write down his remembrances and experiences which have involved all areas of movie-making. Camille comes once a day for 101 days. Film clips, photographs and actual visitors highlight his stories. As he continues to spin his yarns, the imagery in the film smoothly morph into other images. Camille, when not recording, is involved in other exploits including a romance with a production assistant, Mica who aspires to becoming a director. She also begins plotting a way to get to Mr. Cinema's fortune by having a friend pose as his long lost heir. Many other characters are peripherally involved including Death, an Italian seeking the rights to his film catalogue, and a memory specialist. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

The creator of a comic-book series (Michael Crawford) is recruited by a friend in the CIA (James Hampton) to rescue a beautiful Soviet defector (Barbara Carrera). He agrees, as long as he is permitted to don the persona of his most famous character, Condorman. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide

In this routine sex comedy, Jean Chabert (Philippe Khorsand) is the newspaper editor called on to revive the fortunes of a magazine featuring nude women. He is continually distracted by sex-starved secretaries, erotically excited readers, and marital trouble. Jean's dream job soon turns onto a nightmare, as he seriously considers life in a monastery to escape his crazy world. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

Dog Day was originally distributed in France as Canicule. In one of his last film appearances, Lee Marvin portrays a gunman on the lam with girlfriend Tina Louise. He briefly takes refuge with a farm family whose idiotic excesses make Marvin's former criminal associates seem like choirboys. The wife of the household (Miou-Miou) falls in love with Marvin, to the extent of planning his escape when the law catches up with him. Also craving Marvin's sexual attentions is the wife's sister-in-law (Bernadette Lafont), the craziest and most pathetic of the bunch. Dog Day was based on Herman, a novel by Jean Vautrin. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A video-game obsessed street thug imprisoned for a failed robbery attempts to turn over a new leaf by designing a revolutionary video game that could be his ticket to a brighter future. When twenty-two year old loser Tony (Saïd Taghmaoui) isn't out on the streets mugging people for local mob boss Albert (Jean-Pierre Kalfon), he spends most of his time locked away playing video games. Derived of his favorite pastime after being sentenced to eight months in prison for a failed robbery, Tony draws on his platform experience to develop a revolutionary new type of game. Now if he can just convince a prominent buyer that the idea is in fact profitable, Tony may have something to look forward to once he's released back out into the real world. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Clothilde de Watteville (Lauren Hutton) is compared to "Hecate," a three-headed Greek fertility goddess and a protector of witches who came to be associated with Persphone and Hades. Clothilde/Hecate runs into Julien Rochelle (Bernard Giraudeau), a very young French diplomat in north Africa just before the outbreak of World War II and the two have a casual sexual encounter that leads to another such meeting, and another. His interest in her and his curiosity are heightened when she refuses to reveal any information about herself, and when she disappears for stretches at a time without any explanation. As his sexual passions increase at a par with his frustration at her behavior, he gives up trying to relate at all and walks out of the relationship. A few years later they meet at a diplomatic reception in Berne, the diplomat is older and perhaps wiser, but Clothilde's behavior is an inexplicable as ever. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Marcel Tiss (Richy Mueller) is a young punk rocker in Berlin whose main talent is spouting real fire in-between his lyrics every once in awhile. He has the requisite punk girlfriend, and spends his time in the requisite kicking of cans, pinball, and slightly anti-social antics. He runs into Rudy Smirak (Jean-Pierre Kalfon) a Mafia-type whose dour view of life fits in with Marcel's own temperament. The young punk singer is conned into helping Rudy kidnap the son of a wealthy profligate, but when it is time for the ransom to be gathered, things start to go wrong. Marcel realizes he was into something he never wanted in the first place, and when the chance comes to use his fire-breathing technique, he comes through like any self-respecting dragon. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

A director and his actress lover rehearse for a tragic play. Complications set in when their life at home affects their performances at work. The director professes his love for the woman while seeking comfort in the arms of other women in the stage production. The sensitive woman tries to overcome her nature and her lover's indiscretions to succeed in the often callous world of show business. Art imitates life in this slow-moving feature that is over four hours in length. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

The avant-garde founder of French New Wave Jacques Rivette, offers an on-going treatise of film versus theater in this basically non-story about two actresses and a director, or from another perspective, a play and a film. In the opening scenario, a couple come out of a bathroom and are surprised by a group of people. It turns out that the people are the audience watching a play performed in a private home. Among the spectators is Clément (Jean-Pierre Kalfon) a director who invites two actresses (Jane Birkin and Geraldine Chaplin) to his home for the following Saturday, to work on a performance. Clément was having an affair with Béatrice (Isabelle Linnartz) who has apparently disappeared. A magician named Paul (André Dussolier) is his current lover and lives in Clément's home. After the actresses arrive, they find themselves influenced by Paul's magic and start to see their future, while the story they are enacting stays fairly close to Clément's own life. After many rehearsals over one week's time, the play is performed while actual changes happen in the corresponding characters in Clément's life -- until the play within a play ends in an interesting, controversial, yet logical manner. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

A group of French anarchists are moved to violence when their leader Raymond (Jacques Brel) is captured. They take up with the notorious gangster Bonnot (Bruno Cremer) and the gang steals a car to use in a bank robbery. The non-violent anarchists soon turn to killing and murder the guards before escaping to Belgium. They hide out in a whorehouse until a conniving madame blows the whistle on them. The group splits up, but the anarchists soon realize they are helpless without the ringleader Bonnot. The local police chief arrests one of the gang, and the authorities soon close in on the rest of the gang. By now police have enlisted the help of the army to insure that none of the criminals will escape in this mobster movie set in the early days of the 20th century. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

Corinne (Miou-Miou) is a Parisian detective who is transferred to a small village in Northern France when an investigation uncovers evidence that is potentially damaging to some powerful local politicians. She is temporarily given a desk job before she is called on to solve the murder of a little girl. Her inquiry uncovers a child pornography ring that targets children from the working class. Comedian (Jean-Marc Thibault) gives a fine performance in a straight role as the local police inspector. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

Friendship turns to love, and unrequited love leads to a dangerous obsession in this moody drama. Nathalie (Emmanuelle Beart) and Louise (Pascale Bussieres) grew up together and had been close friends since childhood, but while both were studying drama in their early twenties, their friendship went through an abrupt shift -- while beautiful Nathalie enjoyed flirting with the men in her classes, Louise's interest in her best friend turned into infatuation, and when Nathalie indulged herself in a brief fling with a young actor, Louise was overcome with anger and jealousy and tried to kill herself. Nathalie was told by Louise's family that she didn't want to see her any more, and a decade passed before their paths would cross again. Louise is now married to a man named Nicolas (Sami Bouajila), and one night they go to the theater to see a touring production of a new play. To her surprise, Louise discovers the female lead is played by Nathalie; after the show, she slips backstage to say hello, and soon finds that she's as strongly attracted to Nathalie as ever -- and that Nathalie is involved with Matthias (Dani Levy), the gifted but difficult playwright who wrote and directed the production. Leaving Nicolas behind, Louise follows Nathalie to Denmark, and is able to pull a few strings to get Nathalie an audition with Walter Amar (Jean-Pierre Kalfon), a well-known and well-respected theatrical director. Nathalie soon leaves Matthias' show to star in Amar's new production of Lulu, and Louise volunteers to help Nathalie as she prepares for the role. Nathalie appreciates Louise's support and friendship, but she soon begins to chafe under Louise's obsessive attention, and she wonders if history might be repeating itself. La Repetition was shown in competition at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival, with writer and director Catherine Corsini earning a nomination for the coveted Golden Palm award. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

A novelist, an actress, and a struggling young singer all attempt to make their mark in modern day Paris in director Marc Fitoussi's cynical entertainment industry satire. Bertrand (Denis Podalydes) is a French literary professor whose students all know that he is shacked up with pretty math teacher Solange (Valerie Benguigui) despite the couple's best efforts to keep their relationship under the radar. Though no one in the school much cares for Bertrand's prose, self-flagellating student Frederic (Gregoire Leprince-Ringuet) is the one notable exception. Meanwhile, as Bertrand struggles to deliver his second novel, recent big city arrival Cora (Emilie Dequenne) finds that her fondness for outmoded songwriters may be having an adverse effect on her career trajectory. While Cora struggles to make ends meet by working at a popular chain steakhouse, even this attempt to remain afloat ultimately proves disastrous. Somewhere in another part of town, embittered actress Alice (Sandrine Kiberlain) resents the fact that she is consistently passed over for "real" film roles after accepting work as an anime voiceover artist. Yet despite the fact that Alice resents her drama school classmate Annabella (Camille Japy) due to the latter's success on the legit stage, Annabella has her own problems as evidenced by her troubled relationships with her nephew and sister. Later, the engineer for Alice's dubbing session eventually works up the muster to speak her mind, and Cora begins to sense that her luck is finally turning after a chance encounter with veteran songwriter Joseph Costals (Jean-Pierre Kalfon). ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide