Jean-Francois Lepetit Movies
Jean-Claude Lauzon's highly praised film tells the strange story of Léolo, a young boy from Montréal. Told from Léolo's point-of-view, the film depicts his family of lunatics and Léolo's attempts to deal with them. Not one individual in the boy's life is well adjusted. His brother, after being beaten up, spends the film bulking up on growth protein. The grandfather hires half-naked girls to bite off his toenails and, in a brutal rage, almost kills Léolo. As he witnesses his family decay around him, Léolo retreats into himself and the fantasy world he has constructed. In response to the weirdness of his daily life, Léolo creates a little mental mayhem of his own which Lauzon renders in an amazing series of free-form, surreal images. Eventually, this precarious balance of reality and fantasy cracks and Léolo is hospitalized after attempting to murder his grandfather. The score by Tom Waits underscores the narrative arc of Léolo's breakdown. On its release, the film won numerous awards including the International Fantasy Film Award for Best Director (1992) and a Genie Award for Best Original Screenplay (1992). ~ Brian Whitener, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Maxime Collin, Ginette Reno, (more)
- 1992
Roufa (Abdel Kechiche) is an attractive young man, and that works out well for him because he is a practitioner of "bezness:" he's a sex-for-hire boy for the tourists who come to Tunisia. His girlfriend deeply resents his having sex with other women but doesn't seem much bothered that a rich German man he's been having sex with is hoping to sponsor him in Europe. She also has a hard time with his tendency to behave like any other Arab male around a woman, telling her how to take care of her business. As it turns out, she's got better sense than any of the men around her. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Abdel Kechiche, Jacques Penot, (more)
Mary Agnes Donohue adapted her French success Le Grand Chemin for this American version, reworked as a vehicle for Melanie Griffith and Don Johnson. Paradise is a coming-of-age story about a 10-year-old boy named Willard (Elijah Wood), who is sent by his mother to stay with her best friend Lily (Melanie Griffith), who lives in the Delta shrimp-fishing country in a town called Paradise. Lily and her husband Ben (Don Johnson) have been living in an unmentioned emotional vacuum since the death of their own three year old boy. Willard makes friends with the local 9-year-old tomboy, Billie (Thora Birch), who teaches Willard to be comfortable with himself. When Willard gains a handle on his own emotions, he can now help Ben and Lily to connect, overcome grief and rediscover themselves. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Melanie Griffith, Don Johnson, (more)
- 1990
- R
All of Europe was affected by the Great Depression of the 1930s, but some parts were hurt less badly than others. France, for instance, was relatively prosperous. In this grim drama, a sturdy Polish boxer and his family have settled into a mining town in northern France because that's where the work is. Like European "guest workers" in the 1990s, the Polish immigrants then were frequently treated badly by the locals. In this drama, the romantic aspirations of the boxer's son are thwarted by the concerted efforts of the local men and his own family's preference that he marry another Polish girl. After his romance fails, the son becomes a union activist and sacrifices a great deal to try to gain higher wages for the miners, but the contract he works out is reneged on by the duplicitous owners. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Maruschka Detmers, Jean-Marc Barr, (more)
Emile Ardolino directed this treacly sequel to Three Men and a Baby. The middle-aged trio of doting fathers -- Peter the architect (Tom Selleck), Michael the cartoonist (Steve Guttenberg) and Jack the actor (Ted Danson) -- have returned, sublimating their swinging bachelor instincts in order to raise 5-year-old Mary (Robin Weisman). The child of Jack and Sylvia (Nancy Travis), Mary was abandoned by Sylvia in the foyer of the boys' apartment house in the first film. In five years, Mary has grown from a diaper-filling infant to a cute kid who insists that the guys sing rap songs to her before she goes to bed. Sylvia now also lives with the bachelors as she pursues a promising Broadway career. Peter, Michael, and Jack dote on the moppet and parenthood has rarely seemed more idyllic. But Sylvia once again disrupts their placid existence. Accepting the marriage proposal of British director and surly cad Edward (Christopher Cazenove), she announces that she and Mary are going to move to England, leaving the boys high and dry. When it turns out that Edward is secretly planning to ship Mary away to a boarding school after the marriage, the three guys race frantically to disrupt Sylvia's wedding. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tom Selleck, Steve Guttenberg, (more)
- 1990
In 1912, the Rio Negro in the northern part of the Amazon was one of the places where ambitious men went to try and get rich quick in the rubber trade and other jungle-related businesses. In this story, the local population endures the excesses of strong men who vie with one another for power. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Ángela Molina, Frank Ramirez, (more)
- 1987
Francois Marboni (Victor Lanoux) is a butcher who is being blackmailed for having an affair with the prostitute Rache (Pauline Lafont) in this black comedy. He decides to hire a hit man when the blackmailer demands that he start cutting his profit margin to the bone. Francois soon becomes a target of the hitman he hired. Michel Aumont plays the policeman who also covets Rache, with Francois Stevenin as the hilarious hit man. Marie Laforet stars as Francois' space-cadet spouse Marthe. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Victor Lanoux, Pauline Lafont, (more)
Three Men and a Baby is an Americanized remake of the 1985 French comedy hit Three Men and a Cradle. Tom Selleck, Ted Danson and Steve Guttenberg play three upwardly mobile New York bachelors who share an apartment. Their even-keel lifestyle is thrown out of whack when a young woman leaves a baby on their doorstep, suspecting that film director Danson is the father. The balance of the film is devoted to milking as much humor as possible out of the situation of three urbane young men trying to play nursemaid with nary a clue of what they're doing (at one point, a desperate Selleck offers Guttenberg a thousand dollars if Guttenberg will change a diaper). A subplot involving drug dealers is thrown in to sustain audience interest after our trio of heroes become accustomed to a baby around the apartment. "Urban legend" aficionados please note: That cardboard cutout of Ted Danson briefly glimpsed in one scene of Three Men and a Baby is not the ghost of a little boy who died in the bachelors' apartment before filming started. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tom Selleck, Steve Guttenberg, (more)
- 1987
- R
Directed by French filmmaker Jean-Loup Hubert, Grand Chemin stars the director's young son Antoine Hubert. The lad plays a sickly eight-year-old who is shipped off to visit his country relatives while his mother has her baby. The boy's subsequent adventures run the gamut from delightful to terrifying, with a little "coming of age" (via a few glimpses of nudity) thrown in. Veteran French character actor Richard Bohringer, best known for his star turn in The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover, plays a pivotal role. Grand Chemin was released in the U.S. as Grand Highway. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Anémone, Richard Bohringer, (more)
- 1987
When he inherits the family house and property after his mother's death, aspiring novelist Fane (Jean-Pierre Bacri) returns home with his bimbo girlfriend Lilas (Pauline Lafont). He must care for his idiot brother Mo (Jacques Villeret) and contend with a greedy garage owner (Guy Marchand) who covets Fane's property to expand his business. When efforts to buy the property are fruitless, the mechanic incites the townsfolk against the strange trio. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Pauline Lafont, Jean-Pierre Bacri, (more)
- 1986
In this crime story, Antoine (Jacques Bonnafe) is suddenly called home from the North Sea where he works on an oil rig; his wife's body has been found in the Seine. Not accepting the hypothesis that this was an accident or a suicide, Antoine starts to look into his wife's friends and acquaintances and discovers that he never really knew her at all. One of her female friends turns out to have been her lesbian lover, and the two were involved in bilking money from a bank. An accountant at the bank is trying to reclaim a stolen bank code somewhere among the deceased's belongings, and poor Antoine has just begun to scratch the surface of his wife's hidden life. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jacques Bonnaffé, Clémentine Célarié, (more)
A trio of inept bachelors receives an unexpected lesson in the challenges of fatherhood when a young infant turns up on their doorstep in this popular, appealing French comedy. The child was unknowingly fathered by one of the roommates, but the mother, who had relationships with each man, leaves no hint as to which one is the father. Even worse, she's flown off to America, meaning the clueless Pierre, Jacques, and Michel must work together to take care of the adorable infant. As one might expect, most of the film's comedy concerns the men's reluctant adaptation to fatherhood, as they become increasingly attached to the child and compete to become the best father. The film's good-natured if familiar humor was welcomed with strong box office, numerous award nominations, and an American remake, Three Men and a Baby. ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Roland Giraud, Michel Boujenah, (more)
- 1985
This is an affecting story about a father's attempts to mend the breaches in the relationship between himself and his 10-year-old daughter. Emmanuel (Sami Frey) is the father of Elise (Mara Goyet) by his first marriage, and the stepfather of an older daughter by his second marriage. He tries to make the best of both family relationships by taking off to visit his young daughter on the weekends, but that only makes his new family a little jealous -- especially his stepdaughter. She herself is confused about her own relationship with him. After a particularly emotional send-off one weekend, Emmanuel and Elise take a trip from the south of France into Spain, working on a film project. Through a series of round-about conversations, Emmanuel manages to open up a few channels of communication with Elise -- channels that expand even wider when he uses the technique of talking into her video camera to express thoughts and feelings that otherwise would have remained hidden. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Sami Frey, Mara Goyet, (more)
