Rabaté’s poetic Holidays by the Sea hits screens

by Fabien Lemercier

29/06/2011 - The only French representative in competition at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival, which opens on Friday, Pascal Rabaté’s Holidays by the Sea [trailer] (see video interview) is being launched today in French theatres by Ad Vitam on a 109-print run.

Belonging to a wave of comic book authors making the transition to the big screen, including Marjane Satrapi, Joann Sfar and Riad Sattouf, Rabaté made an acclaimed feature debut last year with the surprise hit Wandering Streams [trailer] (320,000 admissions in France). A sort of homage to Jacques Tati’s Mr. Hulot’s Holiday, Holidays by the Sea, which is also inspired by Blake Edwards, Aki Kaurismäki and Jacques Demy, aims for almost dialogue-less burlesque comedy.

With talented performances by Jacques Gamblin, Maria de Meideros, François Damiens, François Morel and Dominique Pinon, the film traces the misadventures of several couples on a weekend break by the sea. It is not without poetry, charm or humour, even if the comparison with its cinematic models and inspirations sometimes turns to the directors’ disadvantage.

Produced by Loin derrière l’Oural for €3.39m, Holidays by the Sea received pre-acquisitions from Canal+ and Ciné+, and backing from the Pays de la Loire region. It is sold internationally by German outfit Film Boutique.

Also hitting theatres this Wednesday are Eva Ionesco’s My Little Princess [trailer], unveiled as a special screening in the latest Cannes Critics’ Week and starring Isabelle Huppert as a scandalous mother and artist (see review - Sophie Dulac Distribution on 45 screens); Olivier Horlait’s French/Belgian/Greek co-production Nicostratos the Pelican [trailer] (Warner Bros. Pictures France in over 250 cinemas); and Italian director Paolo Virzi’s The First Beautiful Thing [trailer] (see news - Wild Bunch Distribution on 36 screens).

(Translated from French)