Alain Sarde Movies

Stephane (Jean-Paul Belmondo) has a predilection for being unfaithful, and when he is caught by his wife with the charming Julie (Sophie Marceau) in his bed, he passes Julie off as his daughter by a former marriage -- someone he had forgotten to mention before. Julie, of course, is not thrilled with the situation, nor is Stephane's wife -- and so the adventure begins in this ribald comedy. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Off-the-wall humor, casual or premeditated violence, and larger-than-life characters are featured in this Paul Morrisey film about drugs and two street gangs in "Alphabet City," the lower east side of New York (Avenues A, B, and C). When the flamboyant and often abrasive Rita (Marilia Pera) and her dim-witted but streetwise son Thiago (Richard Ulacia) arrive in New York from Brazil, she maternally "adopts" the teens who live in a run-down apartment as her own and then organizes them into a gang whose first job is to intercept a shipment of drugs intended for a rival Puerto Rican group. This act sets off a gang war when the Puerto Ricans retaliate by killing one of Rita's teens. As the fighting escalates, it becomes more difficult to decipher the real attitude of director Paul Morrissey: are these serious takes from real life or are they exaggerated to achieve a decidedly black humor? ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

French stage actor Louis Ducreux makes his film debut as a 76-year-old traditionalist painter, Monsieur Ladmiral, in this bittersweet portrait of a brooding artist. A widower, Ladmiral lives on an estate in the countryside near Paris with only his housekeeper, Mercedes (Monique Chaumette), and his paintings to keep him company. The action of the film takes place on a bright autumn Sunday in the early 1900s when Ladmiral's son, Gonzague (Michel Aumont), and Gonzague's wife, Marie-Therèse (Geneviève Mnich), come out from Paris with their three children to visit the old man. While making small talk with Gonzague, Ladmiral hints ever so subtly that his son has become too bourgeois, too conformist, too accepting of the status quo. Apparently, Ladmiral doesn't want his son to face what he is facing: self-recrimination for failing to take risks, failing to go beyond the bounds of tradition. Outdoors, the couple's two boys are only too eager to risk and dare. At one moment, they try to set fire to an insect and, failing, have the audacity to ask for a magnifying glass to do the job. Their father, Gonzague, disapproves, of course, but Ladmiral pronounces his blessing on the project, and he authorizes them to use his glass. No doubt, the old man hopes they survive childhood with their gumption and gall intact -- like Irène. Irène is Ladmiral's other child -- a vivacious, free-spirited beauty who speaks her mind and follows her whims. She is everything that Gonzague is not. Later, she drives her Papa to a dancehall. There, he tells her about his ruminations -- that maybe he should have experimented with impressionism. After examining his current project, he considers whether to make a decision, one that may change nothing -- or perhaps everything. ~ Mike Cummings, All Movie Guide

In this confusing, surreal, and slow-paced drama that swings back and forth from strange to farcical, Robert (Alain Delon) meets Donatienne (Nathalie Baye) on a train. She tells him a story about a woman and a man who meet on a train and subsequently spend a night - only one night - in a glorious sexual encounter before they part forever. He is so taken with her that he ends up in her mountain chalet, not just for one night, but for many - drinking beer and forgetting about his wife in Paris. Donatienne then has sexual relations with all the men in her neighborhood - and the film steps fully into a bizarre world in which neither Robert nor Donatienne can honestly relate to each other. The mystery about what is going on is revealed in the end, but by then the film - verbose, inscrutable, and artificial - may have alienated more than one viewer. On the other hand, the performances of Delon and Baye stand out against this flawed backdrop, an achievement recognized at the 1984 Cesars when Delon won the Best Actor award for his role as Robert. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

In this plodding drama about a man searching for his friend's wronged lover, there is neither high action nor high suspense to keep -- or even reach -- a quick-paced storyline. A shallow womanizer (Jean Rochefort) plays the trumpet in an orchestra conducted by his steady and stable friend (Philippe Noiret). One day a woman bursts into the womanizer's dressing room and tries to shoot him down for what he did to her sister. As he goes into hiding for his own safety, he asks the orchestra leader to find out who he wronged, and try to help him correct the problem. The rest of the film concerns that search, and its resolution. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Jean-Claude Missiaen had a very brief career as a director in the mid-1980s, and this is one of his typical police dramas that allude to American movie tough guys and detectives, to previous films in the same genre, and to well-known police/criminal actors or types (such as Humphrey Bogart). The story revolves around the relationship between a team of two policemen, brash and quick to act, devoted to justice and bending the rules to get it. The duo have to overcome a sexually off-beat, evil woman and a group of gangsters doing illegal real estate deals if they are to succeed on their currently assigned case. The two policemen (Gerard Lanvin and Eddy Mitchell) have their share of shoot-outs and brawls before the bad guys and bad woman discover that crime does not pay as well as they thought. Caught between references to other movies and characters, a certain amount of melodrama, and a wandering camera style, director Missiaen may have taken off in too many directions at once to maintain the interest of most viewers. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

First Name: Carmen tells the parallel stories of a quartet rehearsing Beethoven and a group of young people robbing a bank, supposedly to get the funds to make a film. Director Jean-Luc Godard attempts to make a film that resembles a string quartet, each of whose parts serves an abstract whole. The film is a meditation on the difficulties of youth in the 1980s, the relations between cinema and capital, and how to film the human body. Godard fills the film with carefully composed shots of bodies playing music, making love, and acting violently. His attention to bodies in First Name: Carmen makes the film's images very close to sculptures, particularly those of Rodin. The film's engagement with painting and sculpture continues Godard's ongoing investigation of the relationships between cinema and other arts ~ Louis Schwartz, All Movie Guide

Andre Joeuf (Jean Poiret) is the coldly calculating president of an insurance company who, when faced with the imperative of firing some of his highly paid executives, invites them all over to his country estate for a weekend to indulge in a few games of musical chairs. Anyone left standing after each round will be out his job. The mix of people at the estate and their relationships to each other and their boss, as well as the character of the boss himself, are enough to make most business majors switch to art history. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

A young woman is abandoned by her lover after she tells him she is pregnant. Deeply depressed and longing for home, she boards a train out of town. Unfortunately a terrible train wreck ensues. She survives and ends up taking on the identity of one of the dead passengers. Now comfortable and secure that her child will have some claim to legitimacy, the woman is happy. Unfortunately, her dead-beat lover shows up and promises to make trouble if she doesn't pay up. The melodramatic plot is based on a story by Cornell Woolrich and was made twice before as No Man of Her Own (1932 and 1949 respectively). In 1996 it was remade again as the romantic comedy Mrs. Winterbourne starring Riki Lake and Shirley MacLaine. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Antoine (Gerard Lanvin becomes a cool, controlled vigilante when his lover is murdered by three psychotic men preying on their victims in subways and trains. After acquiring a gun, Antoine starts his hunt for the killers and as both he and the police make progress in their search, they eventually end up at the killers' hideaway together. A police shoot-out kills two of the suspects, but a third is captured and put inside the police van to be booked and jailed. At that point, Antoine and the police differ on the value of the criminal justice system, and with his lover's gruesome death dominating his every thought, Antoine walks towards the van convinced that nothing short of vengeance can bring him personal peace. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Gerard Louvier (Gerard Lanvin), a young criminal trying to stay a few steps ahead of a police manhunt, winds up with Julie Boucher (Miou-Miou), a journalist searching out another story -- who thinks he is an up-and-coming judge with leads on her own case. The confusion is a catalyst for some misunderstandings and general uproar, before the different protagonists sort themselves out and their untenable situation is resolved. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

This French production concerns a gangster (Yves Montand) who retires to the countryside after living a full life of traditional crime. After settling into his new residence with his wife (Catherine Deneuve), his home is invaded by an unruly punk (Gerard Depardieu) who has some new-fangled ideas about the way crime should work. The film appears in French with English subtitles. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide