On the face of it, Grégoire is the kind of husband that makes many a woman wish hers would shape up a bit. He’s tall, strong and stylish, with a job in banking that comfortably pays the bills, and the sculpted good looks of, well, the actor Melvil Poupaud — who plays him with enough upfront charm to cover a slight chill at the edges. All that, and he dotes on his wife Blanche (Virginie Efira), insisting on a degree of togetherness that makes clear his fidelity. Those observing more closely, however, may have other concerns: Why is he constantly calling her at work? Why does she never go out with friends? That he’s a psychotic abuser isn’t played as a surprise twist in Valérie Donzelli’s nervy, finely acted domestic thriller “Just the Two of Us” — even as it dabbles in genre tropes, the film presents an all-too-unremarkable reality for many women.
- 6/29/2023
- by Guy Lodge
- Variety Film + TV
This review of “Happening” was first published May 5 before the film’s opening in NYC and Los Angeles.
Rarely has there been a narrative film that feels more current than “Happening,” a French drama about the trials of a young women attempting to get an abortion — in 1963.
Audrey Diwan (“Losing It”) based her second film, the top prize-winner at last year’s Venice Film Festival, on Annie Ernaux’s autobiographical novel of the same name. Though this is one woman’s story, Diwan (who cowrote the script with Marcia Romano) directs it with an urgency that makes clear: it could be anyone’s.
Well, not anyone, of course. But certainly anyone who finds herself pregnant without access to safe and legal abortion, which is the case for Anne (an excellent Anamaria Vartolomei). Until the moment her calendar reveals the unavoidable truth, Anne is no different from her best friends, Hélène...
Rarely has there been a narrative film that feels more current than “Happening,” a French drama about the trials of a young women attempting to get an abortion — in 1963.
Audrey Diwan (“Losing It”) based her second film, the top prize-winner at last year’s Venice Film Festival, on Annie Ernaux’s autobiographical novel of the same name. Though this is one woman’s story, Diwan (who cowrote the script with Marcia Romano) directs it with an urgency that makes clear: it could be anyone’s.
Well, not anyone, of course. But certainly anyone who finds herself pregnant without access to safe and legal abortion, which is the case for Anne (an excellent Anamaria Vartolomei). Until the moment her calendar reveals the unavoidable truth, Anne is no different from her best friends, Hélène...
- 5/13/2022
- by Elizabeth Weitzman
- The Wrap
Happening is a drama about a young student in small-town France in 1963 who needs an abortion, a medical chore made extremely difficult because abortion is outlawed. I first saw this film in early March, and it was a harrowing and very necessary cinematic experience.
I saw Happening again just after the unprecedented leak from the US Supreme Court indicating that the justices will soon overturn the landmark case of Roe v Wade, effectively outlawing abortion across wide swathes of America. Anyone paying attention in recent years knew this was coming, but the seeming confirmation of it was shocking anyway. Watching this film for the second time with the almost certain knowledge that what it depicts may shortly no longer be historical but current reality once more was like a kick in the teeth.
I cannot overstate the absolute urgency of this film. Movies don’t get much more essential than this one.
I saw Happening again just after the unprecedented leak from the US Supreme Court indicating that the justices will soon overturn the landmark case of Roe v Wade, effectively outlawing abortion across wide swathes of America. Anyone paying attention in recent years knew this was coming, but the seeming confirmation of it was shocking anyway. Watching this film for the second time with the almost certain knowledge that what it depicts may shortly no longer be historical but current reality once more was like a kick in the teeth.
I cannot overstate the absolute urgency of this film. Movies don’t get much more essential than this one.
- 5/6/2022
- by MaryAnn Johanson
- www.flickfilosopher.com
French filmmaker Audrey Diwan’s “Happening” has had a long journey. But it began back at the Venice Film Festival in September 2021 when the jury, led by president Bong Joon Ho and with members including Chloé Zhao, awarded the film the Golden Lion, its top prize. Since then, this sensitive and well-directed abortion drama has notched nominations for Best Director at the BAFTAs and nominations at the César Awards for Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Female Newcomer, and the film also screened virtually at this year’s Sundance. Now, it’s finally headed to stateside theaters on May 6 from IFC Films. Exclusively on IndieWire, watch the official trailer for the film below.
Adapting a 2000 memoir by Annie Ernaux, Audrey Diwan directs French-Romanian actress Anamaria Vartolomei (a quietly volcanic presence) as Anne. She’s a promising young student steadfastly committed to her studies and dreams of becoming a writer,...
Adapting a 2000 memoir by Annie Ernaux, Audrey Diwan directs French-Romanian actress Anamaria Vartolomei (a quietly volcanic presence) as Anne. She’s a promising young student steadfastly committed to her studies and dreams of becoming a writer,...
- 2/18/2022
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Indiewire
Venice Golden Lion winner Happening won best film and best actress prizes
Audrey Diwan’s Venice Golden Lion winner Happening won best film at the 27th edition of France’s Lumière Awards on Monday evening, while its star Anamaria Vartolomei was awarded the best actress prize.
Adapted from French writer Annie Ernaux’s 2019 semi-autobiographical work, Happening recounts a gifted literature student’s struggle to get an abortion in 1964, 11 years before abortion was legalised in France in 1975.
It marks a first lead role for Vartolomei, whose previous credits include How To Be A Good Wife and The Royal Exchange. Vartolomei is...
Audrey Diwan’s Venice Golden Lion winner Happening won best film at the 27th edition of France’s Lumière Awards on Monday evening, while its star Anamaria Vartolomei was awarded the best actress prize.
Adapted from French writer Annie Ernaux’s 2019 semi-autobiographical work, Happening recounts a gifted literature student’s struggle to get an abortion in 1964, 11 years before abortion was legalised in France in 1975.
It marks a first lead role for Vartolomei, whose previous credits include How To Be A Good Wife and The Royal Exchange. Vartolomei is...
- 1/18/2022
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- ScreenDaily
The awards are voted on by 95 international correspondents from 36 countries.
Xavier Giannoli’s literary adaptation Lost Illusions leads the nominations of the 27th edition of France’s Lumière awards, followed by Audrey Diwan’s Venice Golden Lion winner Happening and Arthur Harari’s Onoda, 10,000 Nights In The Jungle.
The awards, which are voted on by 95 international correspondents hailing from 36 countries this year, are France’s equivalent of the Golden Globes.
Giannoli’s adaptation of Honoré de Balzac’s eponymous 19th-century novel, which premiered in competition in Venice this year, was nominated in five categories including best film, director, screenplay, actor...
Xavier Giannoli’s literary adaptation Lost Illusions leads the nominations of the 27th edition of France’s Lumière awards, followed by Audrey Diwan’s Venice Golden Lion winner Happening and Arthur Harari’s Onoda, 10,000 Nights In The Jungle.
The awards, which are voted on by 95 international correspondents hailing from 36 countries this year, are France’s equivalent of the Golden Globes.
Giannoli’s adaptation of Honoré de Balzac’s eponymous 19th-century novel, which premiered in competition in Venice this year, was nominated in five categories including best film, director, screenplay, actor...
- 12/10/2021
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- ScreenDaily
France’s Académie des Arts et Techniques du Cinéma unveiled its nominations for the César Awards this morning in Paris. The races for the country’s Oscar equivalent are led by Xavier Legrand’s feature debut Jusqu’à La Garde (Custody) and Gilles Lellouche’s Le Grand Bain (Sink Or Swim) with 10 mentions each. They are followed by Jacques Audiard’s English-language western, The Sisters Brothers, and Pierre Salvadori’s En Liberté! (The Trouble With You) with nine a piece. All four are in the Best Picture and Director categories.
There’s a noticeably lighter edge to the nominations this year with Le Grand Bain a sort of Full Monty à la française that sees a group of middle-aged men form a synchronized swimming team. The movie debuted out of competition in Cannes and became the 3rd highest grossing local title of 2018 with over 5M tickets sold.
Also out of Cannes,...
There’s a noticeably lighter edge to the nominations this year with Le Grand Bain a sort of Full Monty à la française that sees a group of middle-aged men form a synchronized swimming team. The movie debuted out of competition in Cannes and became the 3rd highest grossing local title of 2018 with over 5M tickets sold.
Also out of Cannes,...
- 1/23/2019
- by Nancy Tartaglione
- Deadline Film + TV
The swimming is synchronized in “Sink or Swim,” and so is the scripting: Gilles Lellouche’s feelgood buddy comedy so painstakingly mimics the rhythms and motions of assorted men-in-quirky-crisis farces from across the Channel that it may as well have been titled “The Pool Monty.” Gathering an A-team of French thesps to play a decidedly less well-qualified squad of million-dollar mermen, this story of disenfranchised middle-aged schmoes who decide — for reasons barely clear to them, much less the viewer — to find renewed purpose in water ballet is as harmless as it is silly, but dampened by idle gags, empty characterization and an inordinate two-hour runtime. The reliably charismatic work of its players, notably ringleader Mathieu Amalric, keeps this somewhat soggy macaron diverting, but it’s hard to see audiences showing much interest outside France, where it should do, well, swimmingly.
A chirpily commercial enterprise through and through, “Sink or Swim...
A chirpily commercial enterprise through and through, “Sink or Swim...
- 5/23/2018
- by Guy Lodge
- Variety Film + TV
Cedric Jimenez‘s The Connection is a handling of a scenario touched upon from an American perspective in William Friedkin’s classic 1971 film The French Connection. A nicely mounted production peppered with several visually arresting moments and fine attention to period detail doesn’t have the same powerful draw as the earlier title. Unfortunately, Jimenez’s film often feels a bit too derivative by today’s standards of true crime epics. A great cast, headlined by Jean Dujardin and Gille Lelouche are reason enough to give the title a look, while it’s mid-July theatrical release (following mostly positive reviews out of the premiere at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival) yielded mild box office.
The Connection (aka La French) may not appear to be anything special. And the truth of the matter is, it really isn’t, except for the fact that it’s loosely related to the long spanning...
The Connection (aka La French) may not appear to be anything special. And the truth of the matter is, it really isn’t, except for the fact that it’s loosely related to the long spanning...
- 9/22/2015
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Late last year, moviegoers followed Dr. Holden and his collegues into the ancient corridors of a cursed tomb in Grégory Levasseur's The Pyramid, now available to watch on Digital HD from Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment, with a Blu-ray and DVD release slated for May 5th. With viewers now able to explore the creepy confines of The Pyramid from the comfort of their couches, we caught up with Levasseur to discuss intertwining horror with Ancient Egyptian culture, revisiting The Hills Have Eyes shooting location, filming in tight spaces, and much more.
Thank you very much for taking the time to talk with us, Grégory. Ancient Egyptian culture is interwoven throughout The Pyramid and plays a big role in the onscreen scares. Were you interested in that era of history prior to directing the film?
Grégory Levasseur: I'm interested in history in general, but my Egyptian knowledges were pretty limited,...
Thank you very much for taking the time to talk with us, Grégory. Ancient Egyptian culture is interwoven throughout The Pyramid and plays a big role in the onscreen scares. Were you interested in that era of history prior to directing the film?
Grégory Levasseur: I'm interested in history in general, but my Egyptian knowledges were pretty limited,...
- 4/17/2015
- by Derek Anderson
- DailyDead
Ever since Martin Scorsese made Goodfellas, giving the crime thriller a shot of sleek cool and moral complexity that moviegoers had not seen since the days of Delon and Melville, directors have hoped to recreate that film’s bustling energy and unnerving stabs at violence. In the process, many of those filmmakers have just ripped off Scorsese’s stylistic impulses, like electric montages to American rock and roll music, and glorified, sweeping long takes. However, Scorsese’s proclivity to craft absorbing, deeply conflicted heroes and villains is harder for others to master. Case in point: Cédric Jimenez’s stylish but formulaic true-crime thriller The Connection, which makes its world premiere at the Toronto Film Festival this week.
The title refers to the infamous “French Connection” heroin ring. Seasoned moviegoers and fans of 1970s cinema know that name from the Oscar-winning thriller with Gene Hackman as Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle. Well, that...
The title refers to the infamous “French Connection” heroin ring. Seasoned moviegoers and fans of 1970s cinema know that name from the Oscar-winning thriller with Gene Hackman as Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle. Well, that...
- 9/4/2014
- by Jordan Adler
- We Got This Covered
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