Melvil Poupaud Movies

Ray Winstone, Ian McShane, John Hurt, Tom Wilkinson, Stephen Dillane, and Joanne Whalley star in first time feature filmmaker Malcolm Venville's darkly comic tale of a man who rallies his friends in order to seek revenge against the French waiter who recently slept with his wife. Sexy Beast scribes Louis Mellis and David Scinto pen the screenplay for a film produced by Richard Brown and Steve Golin. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

An adaptation of Agatha Christie's 1929 short story "The House of Lurking Death," this French-language whodunit represents director Pascal Thomas's third Christie adaptation, following the 2005 By the Pricking of My Thumbs and the 2007 Towards Zero; like Thumbs, it hones in on Prudence (Catherine Frot) and Belisaire Beresford (Andre Dussollier), a married pair of amateur sleuths. This particular outing is set at Christmastime, and finds the Rhone Alps-dwelling Beresfords visited by a beloved aunt, Auntie Babette (Annie Cordy), who promptly informs them that she spotted a murder through a rainy window while seated on a train. Eager for a new crime to solve, Prudence jumps into the case when Belisaire leaves town on a weekend jaunt, and makes her way to a creepy chateau in the middle of the forest, populated by the most unpleasant of families. Inhabitants include an eccentric patriarch widower named Roderick Charpentier (Claude Rich), his morose daughter Emma (Chiara Mastroianni), his conniving and paranoid sons (Christian Vadim, Alexandre Lafaurie and Melvil Poupaud), and a local country doctor (Hippolyte Girardot). Prudence takes a position as a cook at the residence, and when the body crops up, it soon falls on her shoulders to ferret out the murderer. Soon, her husband joins her at the house, tipped off by a local detective regarding his wife's whereabouts. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide

By the Pricking of My Thumbs director Pascal Thomas returns to the written word of Agatha Christie for inspiration, and the result is a lively whodunit centering on a deadly family gathering and the exquisite sleuthing skills of hyper-perceptive crime-fighter Superintendent Bataille. For the past twenty-odd years, elderly dowager Camilla Tresillian (Danielle Darrieux) has maintained a quiet existence in her sprawling mansion, where her every need is attended to by professional caretaker Marie-Adeline (Alessandra Martines) and stern-eyed personal maid Barrette (Carmen Durand). The familiar silence of Camilla's world is suddenly interrupted, however, when a series of relatives including her spendthrift nephew Guillaume (Melvil Poupaud) and his second wife Caroline (Laura Smet) are summoned to her mansion for a long overdue family gathering. Much to the Guillaume's dismay, his first wife Aude (Chiara Mastroianni) is also on the guest list, as is worldly adventurer Thomas Rondeau (Clement Thomas), who has always carried a torch for the pretty divorcée. Likewise, notorious ladies man Fred Latimer (Xavier Thiam) turns up casting a longing gaze at Caroline, and as the rest of the guests begin to arrive it becomes increasingly apparent that they all anticipate a hearty inheritance from their increasingly frail host. When Judge Trevoz (Jacques Sereys), a special guest of Camilla's, becomes the first victim in a painstakingly planned double homicide, it begins to appear as if Guillaume's greed has finally gotten the best of him. As with most well executed crimes, however, the truth is a far cry from initial appearances and fortunately Superintendent Bataille just so happens to be vacationing in the region. Now, as the clue-sniffing sleuth and his policeman nephew interrupt Camilla's party in hopes of ferreting out a killer, it quickly becomes apparent that everyone in the mansion has a motive for murder. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Diagnosed with terminal cancer and given only a short while to live, a successful fashion photographer embarks on one final journey in the second of three films in a trilogy about death and mourning from French director François Ozon (the first entry in the the trilogy was Under the Sand) . After passing out during a particularly grueling photo shoot, high profile shutterbug Romain (Melvil Poupaud) is shocked to discover that his body has been ravaged by a fully metastasized cancer that will soon kill him. Without revealing the cause for his erratic behavior, the shell shocked Romain commences to alienate his entire family and ditch his handsome young boyfriend before connecting with affable waitress Jany (Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi) at a roadside café while en route to his grandmother's house. Upon arriving at the home of the one family member he knows will be joining him shortly in death, Romain's naked vulnerability is met with a gentle ear and sound advice. Once again meeting with the kindly Jany on his way to his ultimate fate, Romain and the waitress strike up an unusual bargain. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Ebullient drag queens do battle with repressive police in The Heart's Root, a fantastical film set in Lisbon. The city's protector, Saint Anthony, is the patron saint of lovers and also the inspiration behind "the brides of St. Anthony," a group of transvestites that dances through the city's streets in the name of freedom and liberation. They are threatened by Cato (Luis Miguel Cintra), a self-serving mayoral candidate who pines in unrequited love for Silvia (Joana Barcia), a friend of the aforementioned transvestites and protege of the formidable madam of one of Lisbon's brothels. Meditations on pornography, religion, fascism, and sex abound. ~ Rebecca Flint Marx, All Movie Guide

Music video director Michael Shamberg debuts with this experimental drama about a woman who comes to terms with painful childhood memories. Orlando (Stanton D. Miranda) is an expatriate American sports journalist living in Paris. She is also slowly recovering from childhood sexual abuse from her father and an incestuous relationship with her late brother. As she wanders the streets on a rainy evening, she sullenly ruminates over her memories. Both Kristin Scott Thomas and Christina Ricci play small parts in this film, while legendary filmmaker Chris Marker provides computer graphics. Souvenir was screened at the 1999 Mill Valley Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide

Raul Ruiz directed this typically eccentric look at the nature of crime, the human mind, and life in the modern world. Solange (Catherine Deneuve) is a defense attorney with a reputation for taking on cases that can't be won -- and proving it by losing them. Her latest lost cause is Rene (Melvil Poupaud), a young man on trial for murdering his Aunt Jeanne (also played by Deneuve), a cruel psychiatrist who raised him as a child and was convinced from infancy that he was destined for a life of crime. While Rene would seemingly need a good lawyer in his situation, he prefers instead to play games with Solange's mind and finds unlikely allies in a strange society of French and Belgian psychologists, headed by Georges (Michel Piccoli), who seems crazier than anyone he's treating. Solange, however, finds herself falling in love with Rene, which only makes a difficult situation more unpleasant for everyone. Through a series of layered flashbacks, we're shown Rene's crime several times from a number of perspectives, which ultimately makes his actions seem more vague with each repetition. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Marcello Mastroianni plays several different roles in this off-beat, witty exploration of a man with multiple personalities from world-class filmmaker Raúl Ruiz. Mastroianni first appears as Parisian traveling salesman Mateo Strano who suddenly shows up at the home of Maria, the wife he abandoned twenty years before. She eventually remarried Andre. Mateo begins telling the skeptical Andre that he never really left Marie. Instead he was bewitched by fairies and has been living in the apartment across the street the entire time. He seems so serious, that he is able to lure Andre to the alleged apartment. There Mateo murders him with a hammer and then calmly returns to Maria who seems nonplused by the sudden turn. With pride she shows Mateo their adopted daughter. Mastroianni next appears as Sorbonne professor of negative anthropology Georges Vickers, a grown man who still lives with his cranky mother until he inexplicably leaves to become a vagrant. Living on the streets, he encounters Tania, a streetwalker with a passion for the philosophies of author Carlos Castaneda's Don Juan. The hooker and the tramp stay together until the day that Vickers returns and he leaves. It is soon afterward that he discovers that Tania is really the president of a major corporation. When he learns that she has been jailed for attempting to murder her creepy ex-husband, Vickers uses his clout to save her. The story then jumps to a newlywed couple happily struggling in a humble garret. Their lives change dramatically when a benefactor suddenly appears and provides them with a marvelous country house. They are also given a mute butler (Mastroianni) who answers their every beck and call. It doesn't take the couple long to figure out that the sinister valet (who actually owns the chateau) is quietly poisoning them. In terror they leave, but later he finds them and demands that they give him their baby daughter. He gives the child to Maria, Mateo's wife. Mastroianni's fourth persona, that of industrial magnate Luc Alamand then appears. He is in trouble when he learns that the wife, daughter, and sister he manufactured to impress potential clients are actually coming. The stress causes the sudden emergence of his other disparate personalities. Interestingly, though each live wildly different lives, they are clearly the same mild-mannered, self-effacing character. The comedy in the story works on wildly different levels with sight gags and puns running simultaneously with literary and cultural satire. Beneath it all runs a serious message about the destructiveness and confusion caused by trying to create a single European culture. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

The grueling, emotionally torturous world of French preparatory schools provides the framework for this mystery. The deliberately rigorous courses are designed to prepare students to take the brutal examinations for entry into the elite Grand Ecoles, where a select few will gain the skills and education needed to insure a bright, prosperous future for themselves. The story centers on Delphine, a girl from the lower classes, and the upper class Claude. Both young women aspire to attend the Ecole Normale Superieure on the Rue d'Ulm. Delphine lives in humble public housing with her dull mother and two young brothers while Claude, who considers herself a Communist, lives in luxury with her own servant; she is sexually involved with fellow- student, Axel, who thinks himself a fascist. Claude's younger brother Bertrand is trying to become a cadet in the national military academy, St. Cyr. He endures much abuse as he prepares himself. A few hours after Delphine meets Claude, the latter is seen diving to her death from a tall building, something the school officials attribute to academic pressure. Delphine later learns the bitter truth about Claude's death after she herself gets involved with Axel, and Bertrand. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Murder and double-dealing among the idle rich sets the stage for this drama. Alan Cross (Adrian Dunbar) is a British detective who travels to a wealthy community along the coast of France in 1938; he's there to attend the funeral of a friend and wants to find out more about the mysterious circumstances behind his friend's death. Cross finds a privileged British family who were close to the deceased and who seem to live by their own set of rules. Helena Graves (Joanna Lumley) was good friends with the deceased, but she claims to know nothing about how he died. Helena's daughter Celia (Gabrielle Anwar) is engaged to a hot-blooded American but has also been involved in an incestuous relationship with her brother Jeremy (Stephen Dorff); Jeremy harbors a dark childhood secret regarding the death of his brother, and he is courting a Jewish woman, much to the chagrin of the anti-Semitic Helena. Cross becomes convinced that someone in the Graves family is to blame for the death, but it's not until someone else dies that the truth begins to bubble to the surface. Innocent Lies was also shown under the title Halcyon Days. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

The seemingly unrelated scenes in this 110 minute black and white cinematic collage reflect the highly personalized vision of filmmaker Raul Ruiz. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Jonathan (Melvil Poupaud) is an imaginative young man. This film unveils what goes on in his mind as he mulls over his recent reading of Robert Louis Stevenson's classic Treasure Island and the television adventure shows he is watching. This story device allows the highly regarded and very innovative Chilean-born director Raul Ruiz to transform Stevenson's classic adventure tale into a much darker and more complex depiction of treachery and hidden identities. Distributors and producers were not entranced by this transformation, and money for completing the film was withheld, so despite its completion date of 1986, this version, which evinces numerous technical and other problems, was not released until 1991. Gaps in the sometimes confusing storyline are dealt with in a voiceover narrative. Ruiz' work has usually met with a warmer reception, but in this case it received a great deal of (possibly well-deserved) ridicule. One high point of the film, however, is when Pedro Armendariz Jr., as Mendoza, recounts the story of Herman Melville's less-well-known novel Benito Cereno. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide