Celestial Clockwork (1995)
Magical Realism
Colourful and frothy whimsy from Fina Torres in the Magical Realist tradition about a woman engaged in a series of romantic mishaps in Paris
French Cinema
The history of French Cinema is the history of the beginnings of cinema – from the very first films made by the Lumiere Brothers, which screened in Paris in 1895, to some of the first science-fiction and fantasy films by Georges Melies who pioneered most of the major special effects techniques.
France has produced a steady stream of films since. Its next major wave of genre output came during the French New Wave of the 1950s and 60s, which produced a series of experimental films that broke with Hollywood narrative and technique, creating a series of surrealistic, sometimes extraordinary, often baffling and pseudo-intellectual works.
France has its steady output of films that are light comedies, popular thrillers and action films, as well as a strong output of drama and independent works that usually defy a Hollywood norm. From the 1980s onwards, one of the major producers of genre cinema has come from Luc Besson who operates in the action, science-fiction and fantasy genres.
The other major intersection with genre material came during the so-called French Extremism movement of the mid-late 2000s involving a series of horror films that pushed gore, sadism and blood-letting to unbearably brutal levels.
Regular genre contributors from France include Alexandra Aja, Olivier Assayas, Enki Bilal, Alexandre Bustillo, Leos Carax, Marc Caro, Helene Cattet, Sylvain Chomet, Rene Clair, Jean Cocteau, Marina de Van, Claire Denis, Julia Ducournau, Quentin Dupieux, Bruno Forzani, Abel Gance, Christophe Gans, Xavier Gens, Jean-Luc Godard, Michel Gondry, Jean-Pierre Jeunet, Mathieu Kassovitz, Rene Laloux, Pascal Laugier, Louis Malle, Chris Marker, Julien Maury, Georges Melies, Dominik Moll, David Moreau, Gaspar Noe, Michel Ocelot, Francois Ozon, Xavier Palud, Pitof, Thierry Poiraud, Jean-Marie Poire, Jean Renoir, Alain Resnais, Jean Rollin and Roger Vadim.
Level Five (1996)
Virtual Reality Game/World War II Documentary
Chris Marker, the director of La Jetee, returns to SF. Though this is set around a Virtual Reality game, it is in fact a documentary essay about the Battle of Okinawa
Tykho Moon (1996)
Lunar Colony Noir
Film from Enki Bilal, a celebrated comic-book creator in France, about the noirish goings-on and in-politics on a lunar colony
The Fifth Element (1997)
Space Opera/Showdown Against Ultimate Evil
A big-budget space opera from Luc Besson. This offers a dazzlingly designed future but the plot is an inane hodgepodge of bad SF elements with a tone that flails between action and camp
Kirikou and the Sorceress (1998)
Animation/African Folk Tales
The debut film from French animator Michel Ocelot, a beautifully simple series of African folk tales about a young boy whose plain-speaking truths outwit a witch
Criminal Lovers (1999)
Modernised Hansel and Gretel
An early film from Francois Ozon, this offers a modernisation of Hansel and Gretel where the two are teenage lovers on the run before the story turns into a remarkable gay coming out parable
The Ninth Gate (1999)
Quest for Occult Tome
Roman Polanski makes a return to Rosemary’s Baby territory in this work with Johnny Depp as a rare book collector on the trail of an occult tome. Polanski great a great sense of sinister forces surrounding Depp but the film reaches an unsatisfying ending
Princes and Princesses (1999)
Animated Fairytale Anthology
From Kirikou director Michel Ocelot, an anthology of animated fairytales that prove quite delightful
The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc (1999)
Historical Epic
Luc Besson takes on the Joan of Arc story with then wife Milla Jovovich in the title role but in Besson’s hands it becomes a crazed historical action film that unquestioningly accepts Joan’s visions as real
Asterix and Obelix Vs. Cesar (1999)
Comic-Book Character
The first of the live-action films based on the famous comic-books set during the Roman period, starring Gerard Depardieu who seems born to play the part of Obelix
The Dancer (2000)
Experimental Dance Technology
Luc Besson produced film set among drum and bass dance culture in New York that follows an aspiring mute dancer (Mia Frye) who is asked to test a new technology that translates dance to music
Deep in the Woods (2000)
French Slasher Film
Stylish French slasher film about actors being stalked as they put on a performance of Little Red Riding Hood at a country estate. The fairytale is adeptly wound in and out as metaphor.
The Crimson Rivers (2000)
Serial Killer Thriller/Secret Eugenics Program
A strong well-made French thriller that comes with the influence of Se7en involving murders on a mountainside glacier and a secretive boarding school with ties back to the Nazi era
Baise-Moi (2000)
Two Girls on a Killing Spree
Splendidly nasty French film that feels like Thelma and Louise by way of Natural Born Killers where two women pick up guns and go on a shooting spree against men who are abusive jerks. Directed by two women and cast with porn actresses, this holds little back
With a Friend Like Harry (2000)
Sinister Houseguest
French psycho-thriller where Sergi Lopez gives an unnervingly charming performance as a psychopathic schoolfriend who inserts himself into Laurent Lucas’s life
Brotherhood of the Wolf (2001)
18th Century Beast Hunt
From regular genre director Christophe Gans, this is a head-scratching mix of French historical drama, monster movie and imported Wu Xia action moves
Just Visiting (2001)
Time Travel Comedy
The US remake of the French time travel comedy Les Visiteurs. With a script by John Hughes, this imports the original film’s stars but misses its comedy charms by a mile
Vidocq (2001)
Dark Historical Fantasy
A film based on the real-life figure of Francois Vidocq, who became the world’s first detective, which the film uses as the stepping off point to create an exquisite dark fantasy
Trouble Every Day (2001)
Sex and Cannibalism
Acclaimed director Claire Denis makes a quite out there film in which people are obsessively driven to devour others during the act of sex
Asterix & Obelix: Mission Cleopatra (2002)
Comic-Book Character
The second of the live-action Asterix films starring Gerard Depardieu, this is a visual delight that gets the comic-book’s nonsensical visuals down perfectly
Malefique (2002)
Jailed Prisoners Find an Occult Tome
Effective and unusual French film in which four prisoners in a jail cell discover an occult tome in the walls and start reading its spells thinking it can offer a means of escape
Femme Fatale (2002)
Psycho-Thriller
Brian De Palma makes a return to the classic psycho-thrillers where he made his name, shouting virtuoso directorial flourish from the rafters and pulling off an amazingly contrived plot
Irreversible (2002)
Revenge and Rape
A highly controversial Gaspar Noe film that is all told in reverse chronological order, depicting the rape of Monica Bellucci and violent revenge by her husband Vincent Cassel
In My Skin (2002)
Self-Mutilation Obsession
Fascinatingly perverse film directed and written by its star French actress Marina de Van who plays a woman who becomes obsessed with mutilating her own skin
Demonlover (2002)
Snuff Internet Site/Corporate Espionage Thriller
Corporate thriller in which Connie Nielsen discovers an underground of snuff S&M. This develops a compulsive hold but its pullback to kneejerk moralism is dissatisfying
Time of the Wolf (2003)
Social Collapse
Michael Haneke has risen to great acclaim in recent years; this is one of his earlier works – a slow Tarkovsky-esque work that seems set in a future that is collapsing at the edges. Haneke is a fascinating talent but this is a bit too vague and well free of anything actually happening for me
Dead End (2003)
Haunted Backroads Journey
This starts out seeming like a Backroads Brutality film with an innocent family being attacked after taking a side road detour, only to end in increasingly stranger supernatural territory
High Tension (2003)
French Backwoods Brutality
The film that made the world take notice of Alexandre Aja. Aja serves up a brutal and gore-drenched variant on the Backwoods Brutality film, although things fall apart in an absurd twist ending
The Triplets of Belleville (2003)
Gonzo Animation
Splendidly original and completely off the wall work of stylised animation from Sylvain Chomet
Crimson Rivers II: Angels of the Apocalypse (2003)
Biblical End Times Serial Killer Thriller
Luc Besson scripted sequel to the serial killer thriller The Crimson Rivers. However, in director Olivier Dahan’s hands, this emerges as a empty-headed series of shock images and random action scenes
Saint Ange (2004)
French Ghost Story
The first film from Pascal Laugier who has emerged as a leading French horror director since, a ghost story set at a girl’s boarding school, Laugier does produce some eerie jumps but the script is a frustrating tangle of narrative loose ends
Banlieue 13 (2004)
French Future Action/Walled-Off Neighbourhood
Luc Besson written/produced film that is a French rehash of Escape from New York but director Pierre Morel gives it a series of exhilarating action and parkour sequences
Immortal (ad vitam) (2004)
Future New York/Ancient Egyptian Gods Return
Comic-book creator Enki Bilal creates a visually extraordinary film about Ancient Egyptian gods awakening in a future New York
They Came Back (2004)
The Dead Return to Life
A French zombie film that is about as far removed from a zombie film as it possible to get – the dead inexplicably return to life not to eat the flesh of the living but calm and detached where society’s problem is how to let them return to their previous lives
Angel-A (2005)
Eccentric Angel
Luc Besson makes a charming and funny film where a suicidal loser is aided by a tall and statuesque Rie Rasmussen who claims to be an angel sent to help him sort his life out
13 Tzameti (2005)
Russian Roulette Gambling
Starkly effective Georgian-made film about a young man in need of money being drawn into an underground gambling ring that bets on games of Russian Roulette
Lemming (2005)
Surreal Identity Exchange
A surreal very Lynchian French film in which a deranged Charlotte Rampling shoots herself and then afterwards appears to possess Laurent Lucas’s wife Charlotte Gainsbourg
The Ax (2005)
Unemployed Man Eliminates Rival Job Applicants
Costa-Gavras, a director known for highly political films, makes a dark comedy about an unemployed man who sets out to eliminate his rival job applicants
Kirikou and the Wild Beasts (2005)
Animation/African Folk Tales
Michel Ocelot returns to make a sequel to Kirikou and the Sorceress. This expands the quality of animation and is slightly the lesser than its predecessor but not without its charms
Un Mariage Sans Fin (2025)
Timeloop Comedy
Palm Springs was one of the funniest and most delightful variants on the Groundhog Day timeloop theme. This is a French language remake that relocates the story to the Moroccan desert
Them (2006)
Mysterious Home Assault
French horror film that generates a reasonable level of tension as a couple are attacked in their home by mysterious strangers
Renaissance (2006)
Animation/Futuristic Film Noir
Dazzling French animated Cyberpunk film shot in the performance capture animated process and then rendered in striking two-tone black-and-white
Electroma (2006)
Daft Punk Film/Two Robots on a Quest
Full-length film made by the French electronic music duo Daft Punk based around the robot guises the band adopts. Resembles an extended student film and feels exactly like an SF version of The Brown Bunny
The Science of Sleep (2006)
Dreams and Wacky Surrealism
A Michel Gondry film that blurs the line between dream and reality with hilariously offbeat regard. Gondry indulges his eccentricities to the maximum with quite sublime results
Arthur and the Invisibles (2006)
Miniature Magical World
Lightweight Luc Besson directed children’s fantasy with a young boy shrunken down to miniature size to engage in a series of CGI animated adventures among a race of fairy-like people. Several sequels followed
Sheitan (2006)
French Backwoods Brutality
French Backwoods Brutality film heads in some admirably weird and gross directions but falls apart at the end
Azur and Asmar (2006)
Animation/Arabian Fairytale
Next to Hayao Miyazaki, Michel Ocelot is the greatest animators of all time but one of the least widely recognised. Here he conducts a beautifully made Arabian fairytale
U (2006)
Animation/Talking Animal Frolics
A likeable and colourful French animated film
Frontier(s) (2007)
Backwoods Brutality
Xavier Gens delivers a French copy of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. This is largely by the numbers excepting for a gore level raised to what must be a maximum for the genre
1, 2, 3, Whiteout: The End of the Light Age (2007)
Experimental Film/Future Thought Experiments
Baffling SF film that lacks anything resembling a plot and seems mostly an experimental film about showing pretty light patterns
Anna M. (2007)
Female Stalker
A standout French-made stalker film that leaves Fatal Attraction in its dust. Isabelle Carré giving a frightening performance as a woman who becomes obsessed with a doctor
Princess of the Sun (2007)
Ancient Egypt Adventure/Animation
Very nicely made French animated film based around the daughter of the pharaoh Akhenaton
Eden Log (2007)
Mysterious Lab Complex/Cryptic Happenings
Cryptic and baffling French art science-fiction film involving strange happenings at a laboratory where we never get any explanations about what is going on
Hitman (2007)
Videogame Adaptation/Action
Disappointing film adaptation of the videogame from Xavier Gens that comes with unremarkable action scenes, a script filled with holes and Timothy Olyphant miscast as Agent 47
Inside (2007)
Brutal Home Invasion/Pregnant Woman Pursued
The most difficult to watch of the films to come out of French Extremism about a pregnant woman pursued by a mystery woman determined to tear the baby from her womb
Hellphone (2007)
Demonic Cellphone
A French film about a teenager who buys a demonic cellphone and is able to use it to enact comeuppances against the people in his life. A 976-Evil for the cellular era
Have Mercy On Us All (2007)
Modern Day Bubonic Plague Killer
French thriller about police investigating a killer who is infecting victims with the bubonic plague and leaving Mediaeval clues, all part of an elaborate revenge scheme
Fear(s) of the Dark (2007)
Anthology of Horror Animation
A visually striking compilation of five animated French horror tales. Each varies widely in style but the result is far more extraordinary than many live-action counterparts
Chrysalis (2007)
Cyberpunk Film
French Cyberpunk film with a detective investigating the murder of an illegal immigrant girl and finding a blackmarket in stolen and transplanted memories
Afterwards (2008)
Messenger of Death
Beautifully filmed work featuring John Malkovich as an enigmatic Messenger of Death. A coolly sophisticated and mysterious film that plays out like an arthouse version of Final Destination by way of the Jeff Bridges Fearless
Asterix at the Olympic Games (2008)
Comic-Book Character
The third of the live-action Asterix films starring Gerard Depardieu as Obelix. This faithfully replicates the look and visuals of the original comic-books as the two head off to the Olympics
Me Two (2008)
French Bodyswap Comedy
Lightweight French bodyswap comedy where aging rocker Alain Chabat and mousy bureaucrat Daniel Auteuil end up sharing the same body
Tokyo! (2008)
Anthology of Surreal Japan-set Tales
Directors Michel Gondry, Leos Carax and Bong Joon Ho make an anthology of strange and surreal tales that take place in Tokyo
Babylon A.D. (2008)
Cyberpunk Future
This was critically dismissed – even its director spoke out against it – nevertheless it proves a flawed but not entirely uninteresting French Cyberpunk film as mercenary Vin Diesel is hired to protect miracle girl Melane Thierry
Dante 01 (2008)
Insane Asylum on a Space Station
Finally, the answer to what happened to Marc Caro after parting ways with Jean-Pierre Jeunet. Caro directs what would appear to be a darkly lit and confusing variation on The Green Mile set on a space station
Martyrs (2008)
Imprisonment and Torture
Pascal Laugier makes one of the most horrific films to emerge from France in the 00s. Scenes of grim torture sit alongside a plot that messes with almost everything we take for granted
The Countess (2009)
Historical Countess Bathory Story
Actress Julie Delpy directs/stars in an adaptation of the Countess Bathory story. In trying to pitch itself as a work of historical feminism and having sympathy for Bathory, this downplays the considerable horror element of the story
Amer (2009)
Giallo Homage
An exquisitely directed homage to giallo cinema – a fascinating work that has been stripped of almost all dialogue that takes place on a purely visual level of sensation and body movement
The Horde (2009)
French Zombie Film
This could be The Raid reconceived as a zombie film (and a few borrowings from Assault on Precinct 13). This never reinvents the basics, just delivers a ferociously entertaining, bared to the bone zombie survival film
Banlieue 13: Ultimatum (2009)
French Future Action/Walled-Off Neighbourhood
Sequel to the French action hit. The plot shuffles the same basic elements around but it is the action we have come for, which is slow to start but soon kicks into exhilarating high gear
Snow White (2009)
Fairy-Tale Ballet Adaptation
An amazing reinterpretation of the classical fairytale as modern ballet for adults. This does amazing things to reinvent the original and is visually extraordinary
Don’t Look Back (2009)
Identity Exchange
French actress-director Marina de Van makes a film about a woman who finds her identity being occluded by someone else’s life. de Van creates a superbly paranoid sense of dis-ease that compares favourably to Polanski’s The Tenant
Mr. Nobody (2009)
Alternate Life Pathways
Jaco Van Dormael film that reaches for epic ideas in a story about multiple life pathways and a babble of ideas taken from physics but fails to assemble them in a way that makes much sense
Enter the Void (2009)
Soul's Journey Into the Afterlife
Gaspar Noe’s hallucinatory Day-Glo vision of a soul’s departure into the afterlife all shot in first-person perspective. This could be a 2001: A Space Odyssey for the trance culture generation
Bluebeard (2009)
Fairytale Adaptation
Catherine Breillat, a director known for her full-on explorations of sexuality, takes on an adaptation of the French fairytale about a multiple wife murderer
Arthur and the Revenge of Maltazard (2009)
Miniature Magical World
This was the second of Luc Besson’s Minimoys films, partly animated children’s films set in a world of miniature creatures. Here the charms of the first film seem thinly stretched
Rubber (2010)
Killer Car Tire/Meta-Fictional Monster Movie Parody
The best killer car tire film ever – a monster movie spoof wound in so many layers of meta-fiction that it is positively side-splitting. The smartest and funniest monster movie in ages
The Extraordinary Adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec (2010)
Girl Writer's Fantastical Adventures
Luc Besson adapts a French comic-book – sort of a female version of Tintin – with uneven but generally amiable regard. The result is somewhere between an Indiana Jones adventure and the quirkness of an Amelie
The Sleeping Beauty (2010)
Fairytale
Catherine Breillat, a director usually known for tackling issues of female sexuality, adapts the classic fairytale in a muddled effort that singularly fails to fly either as fairytale or deconstruction
Arthur and the Two Worlds War (2010)
Miniature Magical World
Luc Besson has made some phenomenal action films but I just can’t seem to get into his trilogy of children’s films. This was the third. A silly effort written down to a very juvenile level and padded with inane humour
The Prodigies (2011)
Animation/Psychic Powered Kids Go Amok
French animated film about a group of kids with psychic powers going amok. Is okay at what it does but had much of its thunder stolen by the more recent and more spectacular Chronicle
Outside Satan (2011)
Ambiguous Miraculous Visitor
In the vein of Pasolini’s Teorema, French director Bruno Dumont makes a film about an ambiguous visitor who may be capable of miracles. Slow, very opaque but eventually rewarding
The Woman in the Fifth (2011)
Mysterious Femme Fatale
European arthouse film that feels like it should have been a horror film. This starts well but when it veers into genre territory, its big twist has been done by too many genre films of recent and holds nothing interesting in its treatment
Ray Harryhausen: Special Effects Titan (2011)
Ray Harryhausen Documentary
A documentary devoted to the life and films of stop-motion animator Ray Harryhausen whose films, which include the Sinbad films and Jason and the Argonauts, have gained a cult following
The Theatre Bizarre (2011)
Horror Anthology
A horror anthology featuring episodes from seven different directors. As with other anthologies, the episodes vary in quality, ranging between the so-so, the mostly quite good and one standout segment
The Incident (2011)
Trapped in an Asylum for the Criminally Insane During a Powercut
From an early script by S. Craig Zahler, this is an incredibly brutal and harrowing work about a group of cooks trapped inside an asylum for the criminally insane during a power cut
Low Life (2011)
French Immigration Nightmare/Cursed Documents
Long-winded French film largely about criticising the country’s problematic immigration and asylum seeking system. This also has a B plot about a series of cursed documents
The Monk (2011)
Monk's Temptation by the Devil
The Monk is a sordid classic of 18th Century Gothic literature, filled with crazed lusts and Catholic guilt and damnation. However, in the hands of French director Dominik Moll, all the tortured sexuality has been watered down and the story stuffed as a costume drama
A Cat in Paris (2011)
Animation/Cat's Adventures
French film that was nominated for the 2011 Best Animated Film at the Oscars. Cute but over-rated, the film is all highly stylised hand-drawn caricature that looks great but never works very hard to engage in terms of its characters
The Extraordinary Voyage (2011)
Georges Melies Documentary
French documentary made for the 150th celebration of Georges Melies’s birthday. Interesting if never uncovering anything new. Too much focus is placed on A Trip to the Moon and its recent restoration
Melies Cinemagician (2011)
Compilation of Georges Melies Shorts
Melies Cinemagician is a special screening of a selection of films from Georges Melies presented by Vancouver’s Vancity Theater to celebrate the 150th anniversary of his birth. The show was a live performance involving a score composed especially for the event, displays of conjuring tricks and a magic lantern show. The same year also saw […]
A Monster in Paris (2011)
Animation/Genteel Singing Monster
A charming French-made animated film about a genteel singing monster. Nothing profound but this is beautifully animated and sweetly appealing in all the right places
Wrong (2012)
Gonzo Surrealism
Quentin Dupieux’s follow-up to the hilariously culty Rubber, an absurdist film about a man setting out to find his missing dog. You keep expecting something as mind-bendingly hilarious as Rubber but this is more of a mild amusement in the David Lynch-ian deadpan surrealist vein
Kirikou and the Men and Women (2012)
Animation/African Folk Tales
The third of Michel Ocelot’s Kirikou films, delightful tales about the ingenuity and plain-speaking wisdom of a young boy winning out over adult pomposity and foolishness. Animated with a simplicity that is magical
Ernest and Celestine (2012)
Animation/Talking Animals
Entirely charming French animated film from the directors of A Town Called Panic. This is a children’s film that comes with a beautiful simplicity, a duo of winning characters and some side-splitting visual gags
Holy Motors (2012)
Surrealism/Man's Cryptic Journey Through Various Disguises
Genuinely mind-screwing effort from Leos Carax. Imagine a version of Cosmopolis as hijacked by Alejandro Jodorowsky – a series of surreal vignettes that arrives at a major “huh?” ending
The Tall Man (2012)
Child Abducting Boogeymen/Conceptual Reversal Twister
Pascal Laugier returns with this fascinating effort about a small town subject to child abductions by a possible boogieman. A film that is as blatantly manipulative as it is ingenious in its way-out twists and turns where everything we assume is going on at the outset is eventually turned completely on its head
The Suicide Shop (2012)
Animation/Black Comedy
French animated film that is about as far from children’s entertainment as it is possible to get – a mordantly dark comedy that operates in similar territory to The Addams Family in its tale of a family that operates a shop selling items of despatch to the suicidally minded
Camille Rewinds (2012)
Time Travel/Divorcee Revisists Her Youth
This French film is an uncredited copy of Peggy Sue Got Married wherein director/star Noemie Lvovsky a dissatisfied divorcee who is propelled back to her high school graduating year and gets to relive her life choices
Lockout (2012)
Future Orbiting Prison/Action
Luc Besson written action-prison film that blatantly borrows from Escape From New York. An entertaining comic-book of a movie, even if its depth exists no further than Guy Pearce tossing off flip one-liners