Jean-Louis Richard Movies

Adolphe, French director Benoît Jacquot's adaptation of Benjamin Constant's novel of the same name, tells the story of a young man's passion for 30-year-old Ellenore (Isabelle Adjani). After much resistance, Ellenore falls for Adolphe (Stanislas Mehrar), only to find out that his love for her has waned significantly. Though Adolphe did not intentionally hurt Ellenore, she is very much saddened by his lack of feeling toward her. This unhappy love story also features French actors Jean Yanne and Romain Duris. ~ Tracie Cooper, All Movie Guide

Caroline can't get enough of the television coverage about an upcoming manned Mars landing, but it doesn't interest her no-good boyfriend Antoine, who is not only a suspicious lout but who never seems to have a good-humored moment. It's August and it's hot. Caroline leaves their apartment to get some ice cream, runs into an inoffensive man and gets involved in the celebrations at a nearby medical convention. Meanwhile, her unpleasant boyfriend is busily concocting games with his ex-con neighbor, games which backfire on him mightily. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

The first feature film directed by Jean-Luc Godard and one of the seminal films of the French New Wave, Breathless is story of the love between Michel Poiccard, a small-time hood wanted for killing a cop, and Patricia Franchini, an American who sells the International Herald Tribune along the boulevards of Paris. Their relationship develops as Michel hides out from a dragnet. Breathless uses the famous techniques of the French New Wave: location shooting, improvised dialogue, and a loose narrative form. In addition Godard uses his characteristic jump cuts, deliberate "mismatches" between shots, and references to the history of cinema, art, and music. Much of the film's vigor comes from collisions between popular and high culture: Godard shows us pinups and portraits of women by Picasso and Renoir, and the soundtrack includes both Mozart's clarinet concerto and snippets of French pop radio. When Breathless was first released, audiences and critics responded to the burst of energy it gave the French cinema; it won numerous international awards and became an unexpected box-office sensation. ~ Louis Schwartz, All Movie Guide

French novelist Vincent Ravalec made his directorial debut with this French drama about small-time crook Gaston (Yvan Attal) who poses as a millionaire after he picks up hitchhiking 16-year-old Marie-Pierre (Virginie Lanoue). Actually living in a seedy apartment, Gaston deals in stolen goods, but he soon climbs to bigger heists, including car thefts. Concealing his illegal activities, Gaston operates his company, Extramill, out of upscale, posh offices, while he and Marie-Pierre move into a sedate upper-middle-class neighborhood. Life is sweet, but the onset of paranoia, kinky sex activities, and police probes eventually culminate in violence. Shown in the Cinemas en France section at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide

Known to English-speaking audiences as Day for Night, La nuit américaine was director François Truffaut's loving and humorous tribute to the communal insanity of making a movie. The film details the making of a family drama called "Meet Pamela" about the tragedy that follows when a young French man introduces his parents to his new British wife. Truffaut gently satirizes his own films with "Meet Pamela"'s overwrought storyline, but the real focus is on the chaos behind the scenes. One of the central actresses is continually drunk due to family problems, while the other is prone to emotional instability, and the male lead (Truffaut regular Jean-Pierre Leaud) starts to act erratically when his intermittent romance with the fickle script girl begins to fail. In addition to all this personal drama, the film is besieged by technical problems, from difficult tracking shots to stubborn animal actors. The inspiration for future satires of movie-making from Living in Oblivion to Irma Vep, La nuit américaine was considered slight by some critics in comparison to earlier Truffaut masterworks, but it went on to win the 1973 Oscar for Best Foreign Film. ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide

In spite of spending three hours developing the story of French peasant Charles Saganne (Gérard Depardieu), the sweep of this epic skims over the qualities that transformed Saganne from an ordinary officer to a great military leader. Saganne was first sent to a garrison town in North Africa before Colonel Dubreuilh (Philippe Noiret) assigned him to other missions, finally giving him a chance to exercise his innate ability to lead men. After a tragic hiatus in Paris where he fails to promote the colonialist cause, he returns to the Sahara and outshines his past accomplishments, leading a ragtag band of Arab dissidents in some brilliant military maneuvers -- for which he won the French Legion of Honor. His newfound recognition also attracted a society maven who became his wife, and after his tour of duty has ended Saganne moves with her to the village where he was born. But the year is 1914 and Saganne's peaceful village idyll was not meant to endure -- he is again called off to war, and to his destiny. Even though the costuming, landscape, battles, and charisma of Depardieu as Saganne and Noiret as Colonel Dubreuilh are outstanding, and several subsidiary characters deliver emotionally compelling vignettes, the protagonists as an ensemble have not been scripted with much depth of character -- making the three-hour epic seem a bit too long in the end. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Noted stage director Patrice Chereau adds his stylistic flair to this drama loosely taken from a story by Anton Chekhov. A French family is shown as they go through the daily routines of life. Arguing, feasting, crying, and yearning for love are just some of the human emotions encountered. The mood wavers between excessive noise to silence while those not participating in the conversations listen in. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

Jacques Rivette directed this richly detailed six-hour drama based on the story of Joan of Arc. In Part one, "Les Batailles," Jeanne the Maid (Sandrine Bonnaire) leaves her childhood home in Domremy after hearing what she is sure was the voice of God. She believes that she can help lead France to victory on the battlefield, and she persuades Charles, dauphin of France (Andre Marcon) to allow her to guide his troops. Part two, "Les Prisons," concerns the sad aftermath of Jeanne's defeat at Orleans. Jeanne is sent to prison, where in two separate trials she is tried for heresy and impersonating a man, with both her life and the sanctity of her mortal body at stake. A four-hour version, with each of the two parts trimmed down to two hours, is also available. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Acclaimed French director François Truffaut's third and, for many viewers, best film is an adaptation of a semi-autobiographical novel by Henri-Pierre Roché. Set between 1912 and 1933, it stars Oskar Werner as the German Jules and Henri Serre as the Frenchman Jim, kindred spirits who, while on holiday in Greece, fall in love with the smile on the face of a sculpture. Back in Paris, the smile comes to life in the person of Catherine (Jeanne Moreau); the three individuals become constant companions, determined to live their lives to the fullest despite the world war around them. When Jules declares his love for Catherine, Jim agrees to let Jules pursue her, despite his own similar feelings; Jules and Catherine marry and have a child (Sabine Haudepin), but Catherine still loves Jim as well. An influential film that has grown in stature over the decades, Jules et Jim was often viewed by the counterculture of the 1960s as a cinematic proponent of the free-love movement, but in actuality the picture is a statement against such a way of life. Despite the bond shared by Jules, Jim, and Catherine, their ménage à trois is doomed to fail; and Catherine's inability to choose between the two men leads to tragic consequences for all three. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide

Loursat (Jean-Paul Belmondo) is a lawyer who has spent the last decade drinking himself into insensibility with a huge cache of gourmet wine in response to his grief at the death of his beloved wife. In the process, he has managed to alienate his now-grown daughter and is barely on speaking terms with his housekeeper. However, finding the corpse of a murdered young man in a room in his house snaps him out of his protracted reverie. He sobers up, investigates the murder, and takes his place in the courtoom to straighten out this mess. In the process, he wins back the respect and affection of his family. This courtroom drama and mystery is based on one of Georges Simenon's many novels. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

After spending some time with his diplomat father in Germany, a young French medical student returns by train to Paris to resume his studies. He is puzzled by the harsh treatment he receives from customs at the border but doesn't begin to understand why until he gets home and discovers a mummified head in his luggage. He suspects that someone at customs put it there, but is not sure. Instead of reporting the meandering body part, he decides to investigate it using the tools he has as a medical student. It appears to be the head of a Russian who died somewhere in Asia. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Martin Terrier (Alain Delon) has a problem. He wants to quit his job, but unlike everyone else, he cannot do it because he is a hired hitman and his employers would hate to see him turned out to pasture -- he knows too much, and he is still useful. When he escapes to the countryside for awhile, he meets Claire (Catherine Deneuve), and love blossoms. Back in Paris to confront his employers once again, Terrier gets an ultimatum -- do one last job for them and he can go free. He has no choice but to accept, even knowing that the odds on a long retirement have just changed for the worse. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

In this crime comedy, a jealous chauvinistic husband worries more about his wife's fidelity than her safety after she is taken hostage by a bank robber. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide