A contemporary portrait of this eclectic, vital, unique city, told through a movie made of 7 chapters, directed by 7 internationally acclaimed directors.
Based on a true story Farewell (aka L'Affaire Farewell) documents one of the most astounding tales of espionage to come out of the Cold War. Directed by Academy Award nominated Christian Carion (Merry Christmas) Farewell features a stellar cast including award-winning actor/director Emir Kusturica (Black Cat White Cat The Good Thief) award-winning actor/director Guillaume Canet (Tell No One Little White Lies) and award-winning actress Alexandra Maria Lara (The Reader Control). The film also stars Willem Dafoe (Antichrist Spiderman 3) David Soul (Jerry Springer: The Opera) and Fred Ward (Short Cuts Management). In 1981 Colonel Grigoriev (Emir Kusturica) of the KGB (real name Vladimir Vetrov) disenchanted with what the communist ideal has become under Brezhnev decides he is going to change the world. Discreetly he makes contact with a French engineer working for Thompson in Moscow Pierre (Guillaume Canet) and little by little passes on documents to him - mainly concerning the United States - information which would constitute the most important Cold War espionage operation known to date. During a period of two years French President Francois Mitterrand (Philippe Magnan) was to personally vet the documents supplied by this source in Moscow to whom the French Secret Service gave the codename 'Farewell'.
The "widow" referred to in the title of La Veuve de Saint-Pierre isn't a woman, but a mechanism--to be exact, the guillotine, (though the title does take on a second meaning in the tragic final moments of the film). We're on the island of Saint-Pierre, a tiny forgotten French colony off the coast of Newfoundland, midway through the 19th century. A senseless drunken murder is committed and the killer is condemned to death, but zut alors!, there's no guillotine on the island. So one must be requested from the slow, bureaucratic authorities in Paris and, once approved, laboriously shipped over. Meanwhile the killer, a simple-minded giant of a man, is placed in the custody of the Captain, whose beautiful wife starts taking an interest in the prisoner. Director Patrice Leconte has always had an acute feel for place and period--he directed the mordantly witty costume drama Ridicule--and La Veuve vividly captures the sense of remoteness and resentful isolation of this blizzard-swept community. The brooding landscape, all slate-blues and greys, is beautifully framed by Eduardo Serra's camera, and Leconte draws affecting performances from his central trio of actors: Daniel Auteuil, with his intriguingly lopsided face, as the Captain; Juliette Binoche, radiantly vulnerable as his wife; and, in an unexpected but remarkably successful bit of casting, Serbian film director Emir Kusturica as the condemned man. La Veuve de Saint-Pierre may be a touch over-solemn at times, and its message is hardly unexpected; but it's an intelligent, engrossing and richly atmospheric piece of filmmaking. --Philip Kemp
An unsentimental elegy to the American West Sweetgrass follows the last modern-day cowboys to lead their flocks of sheep up into Montana's breathtaking and often dangerous Absaroka-Beartooth mountains for summer pasture. This astonishingly beautiful yet unsparing film reveals a world in which nature and culture animals and humans vulnerability and violence are all intimately meshed.
Based on a true story Farewell (aka L'Affaire Farewell) documents one of the most astounding tales of espionage to come out of the Cold War. Directed by Academy Award nominated Christian Carion (Merry Christmas) Farewell features a stellar cast including award-winning actor/director Emir Kusturica (Black Cat White Cat The Good Thief) award-winning actor/director Guillaume Canet (Tell No One Little White Lies) and award-winning actress Alexandra Maria Lara (The Reader Control). The film also stars Willem Dafoe (Antichrist Spiderman 3) David Soul (Jerry Springer: The Opera) and Fred Ward (Short Cuts Management). In 1981 Colonel Grigoriev (Emir Kusturica) of the KGB (real name Vladimir Vetrov) disenchanted with what the communist ideal has become under Brezhnev decides he is going to change the world. Discreetly he makes contact with a French engineer working for Thompson in Moscow Pierre (Guillaume Canet) and little by little passes on documents to him - mainly concerning the United States - information which would constitute the most important Cold War espionage operation known to date. During a period of two years French President Francois Mitterrand (Philippe Magnan) was to personally vet the documents supplied by this source in Moscow to whom the French Secret Service gave the codename 'Farewell'.
Featuring 3 winners of the Cannes Film Festival's highest honour. Christian Mungui's 2007 winner 4 Months 3 Weeks and 2 Days is a compelling drama set in the twilight years of Communist Romania. Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne's 2005 winner The Child (L'Enfant) is a gripping and suspenseful tale of guilt and redemption. Emir Kusturica's Underground is an epic tale of love friendship and betrayal set against the complex historical backdrop of the former Yugoslavia.
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