The festival will run online from March 1-10, and will also be held via the Holon Cinematheque.
The online program will be presented on the websites of the Jerusalem and Holon cinematheques.
This festival, which was curated by 10 different embassies as well as the cinematheques, presents films from French-speaking countries, alongside films from other countries that have been influenced by French culture. This broad mandate allows for the inclusion of the best new films from around the world. Almost all of these films – which come from Greece, Belgium, Canada, Ireland, Cyprus, Romania, Switzerland, Vietnam, Bulgaria and, of course, France – feature both English and Hebrew subtitles. Along with the films, the festival will also present special cooking videos that the member embassies of the Francophone Association have prepared.
Among the highlights will be Philippe Garrel’s The Salt of Tears. This French film, which premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival last year, is shot in Garrel’s trademark black and white and tells a very contemporary story about a young carpentry student in an old-fashioned style. Luc (Logann Antuofermo) is drawn to various women but does not seem to value any of them, until his father passes away and he suffers a crisis.
From Belgium comes Working Girls, directed by Frédéric Fonteyne and Anne Paulicevich. It tells the story of three sex workers who cross the border from France to Belgium and stumble across a dark secret together. The movie stars Sara Forestier, who was in The Names of Love.
Nicolas Pariser’s Alice and the Mayor stars Fabrice Luchini, one of the best-loved actors in the Francophone world, as the mayor of Lyon. Struggling with burnout, he turns to a young female philosopher (Anaïs Demoustier, who won a Cesar Award for her performance) to help him reengage with life.
Nadia, Butterfly is a Canadian drama by Pascal Plante about a swimmer facing retirement.
Loving Carmen, a Bulgarian film by Nayo Titzin, follows the staging of a recent production of Georges Bizet’s Carmen in the Swiss town of St. Gallen.
Story of Pao, a Vietnamese film directed by Ngo Quang Hai, is about a young woman who is a member of the Hmong tribe searching for her birth mother, against the backdrop of the beautiful scenery of the region where the film was shot.
Lost Lives, directed by Dermot Lavery and Michael Hewitt, is a documentary about the conflict in Northern Ireland from 1969-1998. It features interviews and archival footage and is narrated by Kenneth Branagh, Brendan Gleeson and Liam Neeson.
For the full Francophone program, visit the Jerusalem Cinematheque website: jer-cin.org.il/en.
THE TEL AVIV Cinematheque is presenting its Polish Cinema Week/Polish Zoom 2021, starting on February 21 and featuring eight films that showcase the best in contemporary Polish cinema.
These include Marcin Wrona’s Demon (aka Dybbuk), a Polish-Israeli co-production that retells the dybbuk legend and stars Itay Tiran.
Agnieszka Holland and Kasia Adamik’s Spoor tells a haunting story about an older woman who lives by her own rules that foregrounds animal rights. It’s a suspenseful tale that also weaves in the theme of domestic abuse.
Tomasz Wasilewski’s United States of Love looks at the stories of four very different women during 1990, the first year after the Berlin Wall was taken down, and shows the complexities of the apparent freedom they now have and the difficulties they still face.
Agnieszka Smoczynska’s The Lure, which won the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival, mixes genres as it tells the story of mermaid sisters who come out of the water and into a nightclub. One looks for love from a human being, while the other has a taste for human flesh.
The full program can be found at cinema.co.il/en. Wrona’s Demon (aka Dybbuk), a Polish-Israeli co-production that retells the dybbuk legend and stars Itay Tiran.
Agnieszka Holland and Kasia Adamik’s Spoor tells a haunting story about an older woman who lives by her own rules, that foregrounds animal rights. It’s a suspenseful tale that also weaves in the theme of domestic abuse.
Tomasz Wasilewski’s United States of Love looks at the stories of four very different women during 1990, the first year after the Berlin Wall was taken down, and shows the complexities of the apparent freedom they now have and the difficulties they still face.
Agnieszka Smoczynska’s The Lure, which won the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival, mixes genres as it tells the story of mermaid sisters who come out of the water and into a nightclub. One looks for love from a human being, while the other has a taste for human flesh.
The Polish Zoom event is in its second year and is a production of the Polish Institute Tel Aviv, Adam Mickiewicz Institute and the Tel Aviv Cinemathque.
The full program can be found at https://www.cinema.co.il/