email print share on Facebook share on Twitter share on LinkedIn share on reddit pin on Pinterest

RELEASES France

Surviving in the modern world in Louise Wimmer and A Better Life

by 

Tomorrow, Wednesday January 4, French theatres will see the release of two French features that take a brutal look at the victims of the present-day economic environment, two hard-hitting films that nonetheless remain optimistic: Cyril Mennegun’s Louise Wimmer [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
and Cédric Kahn’s A Better Life [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Cédric Kahn
film profile
]
.

Highly acclaimed in Venice Critics’ Week, Louise Wimmer (see review) is distributed by Haut et Court. Its director, Mennegun, commented: "Lots of people struggle on and do everything to keep up appearances, while they go through extremely serious situations with no help whatsoever, because they are invisible". This economic violence affects women like the film’s heroine Louise Wimmer. "As they approach 50, they find themselves with no status, no money, with no possibility of getting back on their feet again" with "a pride that can become a trap for them because at some point, if you need to ask for help and you don’t do it, you need to be damned strong to hold out."

(The article continues below - Commercial information)

For his second feature, Insight, which is currently nearing the end of the writing stage, Mennegun will re-team with his producer Bruno Nahon (Zadig Productions) and actor Tahar Rahim (A Prophet [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Jacques Audiard
interview: Jacques Audiard and Tahar R…
film profile
]
) with whom he worked in 2005 on the docu-fiction Tahar, Student.

This Wednesday, Mars Distribution will also launch Kahn’s A Better Life. Centred on a couple struggling with excessive debt, the film, which was unveiled at Toronto, earned Guillaume Canet the Best Actor Award at the Rome Film Festival and won the Cineuropa Award at the Lisbon & Estoril Film Festival. The cast also features rising star Leïla Bekhti.

Finally, also hitting theatres are Pia Marais’s German feature At Ellen’s Age [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
(in competition at Locarno in 2010 – see review and interview - distributed by Films Sans Frontières); Pablo Giorgelli’s Argentine/Spanish co-production Las Acacias [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
(Bodega Films); Phil Mulloy’s British animated film Goodbye Mr. Christie (Ed Distribution); and three other French films: Julien Donada’s On the Shore [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
(Kannibal Films), Philippe Lefebvre’s Paris By Night, starring Roschdy Zem and Sara Forestier (see news - UGC Distribution) and Martin Valente’s Someday My Dad Will Come [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
(Gaumont).

(The article continues below - Commercial information)

(Translated from French)

Did you enjoy reading this article? Please subscribe to our newsletter to receive more stories like this directly in your inbox.

Privacy Policy