Bérangere Bonvoisin Movies

Roschdy Zem and Cecile de France star as a Muslim Arab and a Jewish woman who find their four-year love affair put to the ultimate test in director/co-writer Zem's 21st Century take on Guess Who's Coming to Dinner? Ishmael (Zem) is a music instructor at a Paris conservatory. His widowed mother still lives in the housing project in which her son was raised, and his Jewish best friend is the proprietor of a popular independent record store. Clara (France) is a physical therapist who specializes in helping motor-impaired children and whose retired parents live with her single sister in the family's comfortable suburban home. Secular thirty-somethings who never put much credence in adhering to their respective faiths, Ishmael and Clara have remained together for four fun-filled years without incidence. When Clara discovers that she has become pregnant with Ishmael's child, however, the couple's carefree romance threatens to grow complicated as their ethnic backgrounds bleed into the forefront of their consciences and they struggle with how to reveal the development to their traditional-minded parents. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

Serial killers appear in small numbers almost everywhere. Their motives vary, but in every case they are a peculiar breed. This chilling, true historical drama follows the activities of one such man, apparently motivated by greed and opportunism more than anything else. In France during the Nazi occupation, Dr. Petiot (Michel Serrault) offered to help Jews escape the Nazis. They would come to his house, and he would kindly give them lethal "vaccinations" for their anticipated travel to Argentina. Then he would steal everything the brought with them (in addition to their up-front payment to him) and burn their bodies in his home-made crematorium. His crimes were discovered in 1944 when his overburdened furnace drew attention of authorities to him. He escaped capture for a time, but was tried and executed in 1946 for the murder of 27 persons, though (as is often the case with these ghouls) the actual count may have been much higher. This film tells Dr. Petiot's story in an abstract and impressionistic manner which is leavened with a certain amount of black humor. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

The always innovative Taviani Brothers pay homage to another unique filmmaker, D. W. Griffith, in Good Morning, Babylon. Vincent Spano and Joaquim de Almeida star as Nicola and Andrea Bonnano, the latest in a long line of Tuscany-born cathedral builders. Emigrating to America, the brothers settle in Los Angeles in 1915, even as director Griffith (Charles Dance) is preparing his epic production Intolerance. The boys are hired to help construct the massive sets for the film's Babylonian sequence (hence the title), for no other reason than the fact that Griffith is impressed by Italian craftsmanship. As the film progresses, Nicola and Andrea assimilate to their new surroundings, even launching a romance with a pair of pretty movie extras. On the verge of continuing the family tradition, the boys' ambitions are cut short by events well beyond their control. Still, their past artistic accomplishments, like those of their forebears, survive the ages -- but only on the ethereal silver screen. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

An engaging and inward-turning, semi-autobiographical film by director Hugo Santiago uses music (mostly tangos) to underscore the angst of life in exile and features a plot that cleverly leaves viewers in the dark about what will happen next. Fabian Cortes (Rodolfo Mederos) is a celebrated master of the tango who lives a good life outside of Spain but still misses his homeland, and in spite of the Franco government and its unjust repression of certain kinds of people, Fabian wants to return home. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

Overly philosophical and obscure, this talkative mystery remains enigmatic through long, rambling discussions, the murder of a clown who recites surrealist poetry to school children, the release of a barge-owner accused of the murder, and the journey of two half-sisters to Paris. Confusing and inscrutable, this mystery seems destined to permanently remain that way. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

Director Bernard Favre has created the "look and feel" of a moment in time that has long since disappeared -- 1859-60 in the Savoy Alps. Joseph (Richard Berry) is a young Savoyard peasant who has been established in a village with his wife and two children for some time, and like others before him, makes a living by crossing the Alps into Italy in the winter months and selling his wares to the villagers. This story traces a winter's itinerary as the man encounters various adventures in his always-dangerous journey, but he seems oblivious to all the nuances and reverberations of social change going on around him. When he finally returns to his family after many months away, he discovers to his surprise that his village is now a part of France and it looks like a Savoyard would soon be sitting on the throne of a unified Italy. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

L'Adolescente (The Adolescent) was the second directorial stint for French film star Jeanne Moreau. This possibly autobiographical piece is set during the early war years. Laetitia Chauveau plays a twelve-year old girl whose future is determined by the events of one long summer holiday in the country in the period just before the outbreak of the Second World War. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi