Tower to Power

The Wizard of the Kremlin (2025) - Assayas Based on a fictional account by Giuliano Da Empoli, Olivier Assayas, the one of the most astute observers of our ever evolving, complex world, takes on Putin's Russia in recent history, with the star studded international cast. The result is perhaps short on the satisfying narrative, but a fascinating history lesson nonetheless.

The film starts with an American journalist, Rowland (Jeffrey Wright), visiting Vadim Baranov (Paul Dano), a former spin doctor of Putin living in isolation in the suburbs of Moscow. Baranov pulls out a yarn of the chaotic, exciting days after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. As a young man eager to prove himself, Baranov moves into the city filled with other young people, eager to take advantage of the anything-goes, wild-west of the Yeltsin era Russia. While others are busy making money and signaling the dawn of the future oligarchs, Baranov chooses art in avant-garde theater. There, he meets a punk performance artist Ksenia (Alicia Vikander) whom he would have a long off/on relationship with. His work in art leads him to TV and communications and works up the ladder and becomes a producer of a recently privatized national TV station, with the help of Berezovsky (Will Keen), a reigning spin doctor with political connections. The Chechen war was going badly and the Russian public was in need of change.

There's a funny bit about Yeltsin's sagging popularity and his alcoholism and in order to make him more 'presidential' on TV for his reelection, they have to tie him to the chair in order not have have him fall asleep at the desk and slow down the teleprompter speed.

Since Yeltzin is a goner, Berezovsky bets on a former KGB head, young & athletic Vladimir Putin (Jude Law) to be his successor. And this is where things get interesting. Putin, a disciplined former intelligence officer and spy, unlike other politicians in Russia, is not interested in money and wants to have no interference in government from newly minted oligarchs. And he hates the frivolity of TV and spins. Admirer of Stalin, he wants absolute power. While Ksenia moves from one billionaire to another, Baranov becomes a trusted counsel for Putin after his verticality of power speech, pushing his strongman image as what is needed in Russia.

Dano, in his puff dough face and forever smug, fits the role of Baranov, who observes the world with forever cynicism and insincerity. When asked about why he stayed so long by Putin's side, he admits that he is addicted to power. Law is scary as Putin, a one-track minded former intelligence officer and spy, who detests moneyed people and the west. Someone who wants to wield power in a geopolitical game in the new era.

Tom Sturridge shows up as Dimitri Sidorov, a flashy, hedonistic oligarch in the making, of whom Ksenia falls for.

There are tons of films about Russia's recent history, but Assayas makes a somewhat concise overview of how Putin's Russia came about. He juxtaposes the real threat of the strongman who does play by western capitalist standards. Baranov, who was fashioned after Vladislav Surkov, a spin doctor who served Putin in his aggressive pursuit of Crimea and then Ukraine. Obviously, these are villains. But aren't they as villainous as Europe and the US? As Rawland asks about the invasion of Ukraine and violence Baranov orchestrated, overseen by Putin, Baranov counters with all the villainy the West has been inflicting to the world at large. Aren't we as culpable as Putin - Venezuela, Cuba, Iraq and Iran?

Narratively The Wizard loses steam on the way to its fatalistic, unsatisfying ending. But again, Assayas accomplishes deciphering the complicated recent history and reflects on where we find ourselves, at this chaotic, morally ugly present.

Heart of Glass

La tour de glase/The Ice Tower (2025) - Hadžihalilović Lucille Hadžihalilović continues with her coming of age/dark fairy tale with The Ice Tower, taking on Hans Christian Andersen's The Ice Queen. And just like her previous films (Innocence, Evolution and Earwig), it's a visual stunner. The director has a penchant for painting the grownup world as something disturbing and mysterious and The Ice Tower is no exception.

The film concerns a runaway teenage orphan girl Jeanne (Clara Pacini). She is fascinated with the Ice Queen story and the dark icy forest, as she reads the book to her younger foster home sister every night. She runs away into the frozen mountains and ends up in another town, after a close encounter with a predatory old man while hitchhiking. She breaks into what appears to be a warehouse to spend the night, but the building turns out to be a film studio staging the production of The Ice Queen. Jeanne, now taking on the identity of a stranger named Bianca, gets the attention of Christina (Marion Cortillard), a diva movie star with a similar history as Jeanne. The cold, sad façade of Christina gets an obsessive attention from wide eyed Jeanne. With Jeanne's mother dying in freezing cold when she was young, Christina becomes an embodiment of a maternal figure, idol and fantasy all in one.

With their past mirroring each other, Jeanne/Bianca becomes Christina's new favorite, being promoted for the stand-in for the young actress who plays the main role. Christina, a possibly a depressed drug addict (suggested without so many words), has a death wish and wants Jeanne to join her at the edge of the cliff one night but Jeanne refuses.

The Ice Tower is a kaleidoscopic mood piece that plays around with the idea of mirroring images - fantasy and reality, past and present, darkness and light. Cortillard is perfect as an alluring ice queen who attracts people around her to their destruction and suffers from eternal loneliness in her frozen kingdom. The film, shot by Jonathan Ricquebourg (The Taste of Things, The Death of Louis XIV), is seriously dark and moody, and makes the best of its frozen, shiny and empty Northern Italian landscapes.

Ice Tower, just like her previous films, Hadžihalilović aptly suggests the frightening grownup world where things are not as bright and exciting as one hopes to be, but decidedly dour, sad, full of pain and filled with ugliness. Her explorations might be seen as only scratching its shiny surface. But it's usually the negative space behind the façade that looms over all of her films, keeping all the mysteries intact and bewitching us to come back time and time again to see her dark and hypnotic artistry.

Tango Lesson

Being Maria (2024) - Palud French film industry's going through a full #MeToo reckoning with the case of Christophe Ruggia, a director convicted of sexual abuse of actress Adèle Haenel when she was underage. Staple names in French cinema, such as directors Jacques Doillon and Beonoît Jacquot have also been accused of rape and sexual offenses, and actor Gerard Depardieu is facing a trial for rape. In this climate, Jessica Palud's Being Maria revisits Bernardo Bertolucci's controversial film ]Last Tango in Paris and tells the untold story from the perspective of its co-star Maria Schneider and the film's life-long effect on the actress. Schneider, star of many memorable films such as Michelangelo Antonioni's Passenger, Jacques Rivette's Merry-Go-Round, later became an outspoken activist against sexism in the French film industry.

Anamaria Vartolomei (Happening, Empire, Mickey 17), plays Schneider, a young, unknown actress chosen by Bertolucci (Giuseppe Marggio), to star opposite Marlon Brando (Matt Dillon) in sexually charged Last Tango, at age 19. Growing up with a single mother who has very low opinion on men and the entertainment industry - Maria's deadbeat father, Gelin (Yvan Attal) is an actor. Against her mother's wishes with her teenage rebellious spirit, Maria seeks advice from Gelin and way in the film industry. It was the 70s and if you are an established auteur like Bertolucci (who had directed Conformist two years prior), it was 'anything goes' for art. The premise of the film is two strangers meeting by chance and carrying out a strictly physical relationship, baring their bodies and souls to each other. There will be a lot of nudity, so it will be controversial, Bertolucci warns. But you get to work with Brando and your career will be launched. Maria knows what she is signing up for.

At first she finds her experience pleasant and finds Brando gentle. But it's the infamous "butter" scene, an improvised simulated sex scene involving butter, that really breaks Maria. After the scene, she felt violated and humiliated by both Bertolucci and Brando, who never told her what their intentions were for the scene beforehand and never apologized. Her shock and tears captured on screen were real.

Now 60 years old, Matt Dillon has gravitas and hulking physicality to play the Hollywood acting legend Brando. He moves and speaks with confidence and ease with a glimpse of a dark side and arrogance.

Schneider is reprimanded by her manager for speaking out about the incident during the press tour after the film's release. Soon afterwards, she becomes a heroin addict and finds herself branded as 'difficult to work with', by refusing to do a nude scene in most of the roles she is offered. Surely there must be projects that she doesn't have to go topless. Again, this is French film industry in the 70s and 80s where women's roles are limited ('either saints or harlots' Schneider says with a sigh) and her reputation being in Last Tango precedes her. She befriends a college student Noor (Céleste Brunnquell) who is writing her dissertation on women's roles in films and the two become involved. And it is Noor who sees Maria through her drug addiction.

It is understandable that Vartolomei was chosen to play Schneider, even though there's no real physical resemblance. In Happening, she played Anne, a high school student in need of abortion which was still illegal in the 60s France. With all the conservative swing in Europe and especially in France, the film and her performance became a lightning rod for the feminist activism. And she does a great job portraying a principled young Schneider, who saw injustices in French film industry run by men, for men, long before #MeToo caught up with it. Being Maria is a scathing rebuke to unchecked sexism that dominated the film industry for way too long, and a well-deserved portrayal of trailblazing actress/activist.

Preview: Rendez-vous with French Cinema 2025

This year marks Rendez-Vous with French Cinema, running from March 6 to March 16, celebrates its 30th year at Film at Lincoln Center, NYC. This celebrated festival offers a dynamic showcase of contemporary French filmmaking, featuring an array of 23 films by both emerging voices—some selected as part of Unifrance’s 10 to Watch 2025 Program*, a yearly initiative honoring a new generation of directors and actors who contribute to the vitality of French creation—and seasoned directors that tackle relevant and enduring themes. This selection of North American, U.S., and New York premieres celebrates the energy, innovation, and range of French cinema.

The stellar lineup this year includes Visiting Hours by Patricia Mazuy, about two woman forging an unlikely friendship over their husbands' incacerations, starring indomitable Isabelle Huppert, the 77th Cannes Film Festival opener The Second Act by Quentin Dupieux, a meta-comedy taking place on a film set and featuring a star-studded cast, Wild Diamond, stunning feature debut by Agathe Riedinger, a gripping exploration of 19-year-old Liane’s (Malou Khebizi) fierce pursuit of fame as a reality TV contestant, Meeting with Pol Pot, a searing indictment of Khmer Rouge regime by Rithy Panh, and Jessica Palud’s Being Maria, which premiered at Cannes, an unsparing exploration of Maria Schneider’s (Anamaria Vartolomei) trauma stemming from her experience on the set of Bernardo Bertolucci’s Last Tango in Paris, with Matt Dillon playing Marlon Brando.

Being Maria - Jessica Palud As French film industry's going through a full #MeToo reckoning, Jessica Palud's Being Maria revisits Bernardo Bertolucci's controversial film The Last Tango in Paris and tells the untold story from the perspective of its co-star Maria Schneider and the film's life-long effect on the actress. Schneider, star of many memorable films as Michelangelo Antonioni's Passenger, Jacques Rivette's Merry-Go-Round, later became outspoken activist against sexism in French film industry.

Anamaria Vartolomei of Happening, plays Schneider, a young, unknown actress chosen by Bertolucci (Giuseppe Marggio), to star opposite Marlon Brando (Matt Dillon) in sexually charged The Last Tango, at age 19. It was the 70s and if you are an established auteur like Bertolucci, it was 'anything goes' for art. The premise of the film is two strangers meeting by chance and carrying out a strictly physical relationship, baring their bodies and souls to each other. There will be a lot of nudity, so it will be controversial, the director warns. But you get to work with Brando and your career will be launched. Maria knows what she is signing up for. Yet she needs a consent form (because she is underage) signed by her movie-business disapproving mother. But it's the infamous "butter" scene, an improvised simulated sex scene involving butter, that really breaks Maria. After the scene, she felt violated and humiliated by both Bertolucci and Brando, who never told her what their intentions were for the scene beforehand and never apologized. Her shock and tears captured on screen were real.

She is reprimanded by her manager for speaking out about the incident during the press tour after the film's release. Soon afterwards, she becomes a heroin addict and finding herself branded as 'difficult to work with', by refusing to do a nude scene in most of the roles she is offered. She befriends with a college student Noor (Céleste Brunnquell) who is writing her dissertation on women's roles in films and the two become involved. And it is Noor who sees Maria through her drug addiction.

It is understandable that Vartolomei was chosen to play Schneider, even though there's no physical resemblance. In Happening, where she plays Anne, a high school student in need of abortion which was still illegal in the 60s France. With all the conservative swing around the world, her performance became a women's rights symbols. And she does a great job portraying a principled young Schneider who saw injustices in French film industry run by men, for men, long before #metoo caught up with it.

Wild Diamond - Agathe Riedinger 19-year-old Liane (Malou Khebizi), living with her unemployed single mother and a younger sister, lives and dies by her phone, getting followers with her looks and dance moves. Platitude of her fans, spreading across the screen is what she lives for. Her emphasis on her looks - she got a boob job and self-administered Botox on her lips, are all part of getting more followers, so she can be famous. Being rich and powerful are her goals in life. She really wants to get out of her less than perfect surroundings. To her, everyone, including her circle of friends, mom, family counselor, and Dino, a local dirt bike mechanic that she has a sweet for, is beneath her.

She gets a call from a casting director of the popular reality TV show, Miracle Island. And she gets a chance to do an audition. This is the golden ticket she has been waiting for. While obsessing over the callback, all the people around her are getting irritated by her diva behavior. Dino asks her what if she doesn't get the TV role. She sullenly replies that she would kill herself. Would she get a break and show all the naysayers, who tells her that being loved is not a talent? Agathe Riedinger creates great intimacy with documentary style camera work with the help of Malou Khebizi's incredibly natural, vulnerable performance in a soul baring role.

Visiting Hours - Patricia Mazuy Alma (Isabelle Huppert) and Mina (Hafsia Herzi), women from two different backgrounds - one of privilege and the other, working class, meet at the family visiting facility of a prison. Both their husbands are incarcerated. Alma, a former dancer now a bored wife of a neurosurgeon who is serving time for DUI manslaughter, sees Mina in distress and lends a helping hand- she invites her and her two young children to stay at her large empty house, so Mina doesn't have to travel 3 hours by bus to visit her husband in prison. This way, Alma doesn't feel so alone by herself.

A friendship blossoms: Mina takes liking to Alma's directness, biting sense of humor and her generosity. It is revealed that Alma's marriage has been on the fritz for a while, even long before the hit-and-run, whereas Mina still has a passionate love for her incarcerated husband- tears and brief tryst on visits. Mina's husband is in jail for robbing a jewelry store and Yassine, his associate outside, is not liking her new situation, suspecting that she and her husband are stiffing him from some hidden stolen goods.
Things take a turn with the news of Alma's husband's early release and Yassine spying on her. Alma's assessment of her husband's collecting art as an investment gives Mina an idea of a staged break-in where Yassin can take one of the paintings from Alma's house and leave her and her family alone. Alma wouldn't mind and won't call cops on her.

Patricia Mazuy's women's empowerment story has similar dynamics with Claude Chabrol's Hitchcockian thrillers. It even starts with Alma shopping for flowers in visually overloaded flower shop sequence reminiscent of Vertigo. Mazuy is a very competent director and gets great chemistry out of Huppert and Herzi. Visiting Hours may not have the gritty, ultra-violent aspect of her last film, Saturn Bowling, but it's a solid film with great performances and great visuals.

Meeting with Pol Pot - Rithy Panh Based on American journalist Elizabeth Becker's personal experience in Cambodia under the genocidal Khmer Rouge regime, Meeting with Pol Pot tells a three French journalist Lise (Irène Jacob), Alain (Grégoire Colin) and Paul (Cyril Gueï) being invited to interview Pol Pot, known as Brother No.1 in 1978.

But however the welcome party, consists of high ranking officials who were classmates of Alain at Sorbonne, paints the pictures of completely just and egalitarian society that they are shown around, the skeptical journalists can't shake off the feeling that there's something hidden amid tightly controlled the rural work-camp compound. Paul, the photographer, who has tendency to walk off from the carefully guided tour, disappears first after witnessing human remains in the field and his films confiscated. Even though Lise protests of their near imprisonment in the compound and lack of transparency by their AK-45 wielding captors, Alain, who forged the friendship through correspondences with Brother No. 1, is in denial of the rumors of the genocide of 1.5 - 2 million people, and still hoping for a chance to interview him.

Cambodian filmmaker Rithy Panh is known for his documentary work on atrocities committed by Khmer Rouge regime (S21: Khmer Rouge Killing Machine, A Missing Picture), combines archival footage, rare projections, and dioramas with clay figures, along with scenes with actors to tell the story of what happens when an ideology overtakes its intent. It's a sobering, clear eyed film. Jacob, as she ages, possesses Charlotte Rampling gravitas in her acting.

Endless Summer

Du côté d'Orouët (1971) - Rozier Three hardworking Parisiannes Caroline (Caroline Cartier), her cousin Kareen (Françoise Guégan) and Joélle (Danièle Croisy) go on late Summer vacation to Orouët, the coastal town near Nantes. Caroline's mother has a place near the beach they can stay at. For the trio of young women, the late summer is all giggles, sunbathing and freedom in off season at the beach. Then Joélle's work boss Gilbert (Bernard Menez) shows up at their doorstep. It is obvious that Gilbert, who has office crush on Joélle, tracked her down with "Oh I was just in the neighborhood and what a coincidence that we are taking a vacation in the same area!" spiel. He forces his way into the girls' summer house. His insistence can be annoying at times but he has a goofy, nerdy charm to him. He takes a lot of abuse from the girls being the only guy in the group. But their dynamics change when they meet up with suave local sailor Patrick (Patrick Verde), who takes girls sailing in his boat. Patrick ends up with Kareen, but it's pretty obvious that Joélle's jealous. Little tensions rise.

With 2 1/2 hr running time, Jacques Rozier's long winded summer holidays movie with the always watchable trio of lovely working class girls, is filled with shrieking laughter, lazy afternoons, hazy late summer sun and boozy nights. Rozier's not really interested in a melodrama with summer flings. Du côté d'Orouët is more interested in capturing the excitement of summer vacation and its fleeting nature. Mostly handheld sunkissed cinematography has an intimate home movie feel to it.

You, the Living

Fin août, début septembre/Late August, Early September (1998) - Assayas Again, more I watch Olivier Assayas's films, they remind me what a great writer he is - how perceptive and insightful he is in every character and situation. That he is one of the great working writer/directors I admire most. Late August, Early September is no exception. Its down to earth characters and their approach to life that they lead, warts and all, are all too believable. I remember someone on the internet asking what filmmaker's films you want to live in- a decidedly a corny question, and thinking about it for a minute at the time but couldn't come up with an answer. After watching August/September, if I have a choice, I can safely say that I'd want to live in Assayas movies.

Late August, Early September concerns Gabriel (played fluidly by the great Mathieu Amalric), a literary editor/translator/documentary filmmaker, being tasked to interview a recluse writer Adrien (François Cluzet), since they think Gabriel is the one Adrien can trust and open up to. Adrien is a good writer - not a big famous one, but a good one. Always broke. And he does open up to Gabriel, after Gabriel accompanies him to the countryside to his childhood hometown. It's a friendship built on respect and admiration.

While juggling his professional career, Gabriel is also going through a breakup with live-in partner Jenny (Jeanne Balibar). They are trying to sell their apartment and split the money. It's hard when they still have feelings for each other and all your friends and family are mutual, wherever they go. Then there's Anne (Virginie Ledoyen), Gabriel's new young, hot-headed fling who is very into a physical, sexual relationship. Anne is trouble and she herself knows it too.

Then there is Vera (Mia Hansen-Løve, the real life partner of Assayas and an esteemed director herself), a high-schooler and Adrien's secret girlfriend: there's a poignant thread of this unrecognized love, only to be revealed after Adrien's untimely death, which affects great many people, especially Gabriel.

Early August, Late September sketches out very naturally (with Assaya's signature handheld, grainly Super 16mm), a creative person's life and its ups and downs and the meaningful relationships he forms. As usual, jobs don't define these characters. Their interactions feel genuine and truthful. Their joy and sorrow deeply felt. It's amazing how everyone looks so young in this, but at the same time so mature, compared to other characters these actors imbibe in their later years. Wistful yet hopeful, the film is a beautiful elegy to the vagaries of life. Loved it.

Self-Portrait

C'est pas moi/It's Not Me (2024) - Carax The question, "Who is Leos Carax?" was put on the French filmmaker of such films as Holy Motors and Annette by a museum, in preparation of an exhibit that didn't happen - explains Carax in the beginning of this 41 minute self-portraiture, ironically titled, C'est Pas Moi/It's Not Me. Like many artists, Carax has had his share of ups and downs in his 40-year career: Once touted as Godard's heir-apparent and an enfant terrible of French cinema, his grand, blurring vision of young love and cinema got him into a lot of trouble. His passionate affair with Juliette Binoche, and stormy relationship with the late Lithuanian actress Katerina Golubeva (whom he had a daughter with, Nastya Golubeva Carax, who is in the film), are often reflected in his films.

In C'est pas moi, Carax pays not too subtle homage to the late mentor, Jean-Luc Godard, in more ways than one. JLG's signature wordplay displays on the center of the screen in C'est pas moi, same size, same font - linking cinema, history and ghosts. His gravelly voice narration also reminds me of the late old master. He even includes a voice message Godard left him on his phone.

Here comes the full circle: Carax's earlier films were heavily influenced by the French New Wave. He started his career as a JLG's pupil (even appearing in JLG film King Lear), garnered acclaim for imitating JLG's style, but without the weight of the political, cultural subjects of his mentor. Instead, he aimed for youthful love, longing and whimsy that attracted many admirers like me. After the long hiatus (his magnum opus Les amants du Pont-Neuf/Lovers on the Bridge (1991)and its subsequent box office and critical failure almost destroyed his career and couldn't finance another film for decades), his resurrection with Holy Motors (2012) and Annette (2021), two very self-reflexive, fantastical films, Carax is back, embracing Godard again more openly, for the benefit of composing a dense, visually sumptuous self-portrait.

All Carax's past films are present – his vibrant color palette pristinely preserved in glorious celluloid (he was once idiosyncratically grouped with other 80s French filmmakers as ‘Cinema du Look’ in conjunction with his then cinematographer, the late Jean-Yves Escoffier).

It’s almost euphoric to see adorable faces of young Binoche, Julie Delpy and Golubeva, also baby Denis Lavant, a longtime collaborator of Carax, playing the filmmaker’s alter ego, Alex (Carax’s real name is Alex Oscar Dupont). His penchant for controversy (or bad French humor) is there too - in the form of Hitler and Polanski.

Carax is not a visual essayist commenting and reflecting on the state of the chaotic world we live in - maybe only a little bit but not in Godard's sense. The film is all about him. And it's beautiful and glorious. It builds up to a stormy solo piano session of the theme from The Young Girls of Rochefort, played by his daughter, Nastya - perfectly capturing the essence of Carax's career, his sentimentality, his art and beauty haunted by the ghosts of the past (including but not limited to departed: Golubeva, Guillaume Depardieu, Escoffier, Godard). C’est pas moi is the best cinematic self-portrait of an artist you can wish for. One of the year’s very best

Repatriation

Dahomey (2024) - Diop Darkness. Then a booming female/male voice announces the journey to their homeland. It's the voice of a statue, one of the 26 such artifacts France is sending back to its former colony, Benin. The statue was taken by the French soldiers from the kingdom of Dahomey 130 years ago. The voice raises concerns about its return since it was uprooted from their homeland so long ago. It's made from the image of King Ghezo, who ruled the kingdom in the early 19th Century. It doesn't have a name. The name that was given for this occasion is 26, as in, the 26th statue that was chosen to make the journey back out of 7,000 artifacts that are currently in Europe after being taken from Benin.

Mati Diop, acclaimed French actor/director (Atlantics) with Senegalese ancestry, chronicles the journey of the artifacts step by step in Dahomey, from handling and putting them into the wooden crates by workers, under the watchful eyes of artists and other cultural emissaries, painstakingly assessing the conditions of each wooden pieces of art. They comment on the significance of the events. Diop’s camera joins the serious gaze of these officials and respectfully captures these large, awe inspiring objects - Besides King Ghezo's likeness, there's King Glele as half-man, half- lion, King Béhanzin as half-man, half-Shark. There are exquisitely carved thrones and doors of the kings taken from the Royal Palace of Abomey of the Dahomey kingdom. The return of these artifacts are the result of what came as calls mount in Africa for European countries to return the colonial spoils in their museums, universities and private collections.

As the large, magnificent artifacts are getting set up in Benin's Presidential Palace for exhibition, Diop cross-cuts the exhibition with the lively debates on the repatriation in a public forum among young people, in the background of bustling Cotonou, the capital of Benin.

The return is a direct result of a pressure campaign by local and international activists. In the forum, some liken the return to putting the souls back to these artifacts. Still, some see it as a shrewd ploy by Macron and Patrice Talon, Benin's president, who are eager to score political points with the African populace. Some see it as an insult, with only 26 out of thousands being returned and deem that celebration is premature. For others, the return is welcome, but understand the repatriation of physical culture doesn't replace the intangible culture - song, dance and oral storytelling which stood in place of the absence of these objects. Through these spirited debates, Diop captures the awakening national pride, questioning the remnants of the colonial education system and even speaking French as the official language - when there are many different local languages spoken throughout the country. No one can argue that the return is not a good start though. It's reflected in the faces of the children when they see these treasures in person at the exhibition.

Dahomey is a spiritual heir to Alain Resnais and Chris Marker's 1953 essay film, Statues Also Die (1953) about how colonialism affected the way African Art is perceived and also Abderramane Sissako's Bamako (2006) in terms of self-determination and awakening of African consciousness through debates in the globalized world. It's a hopeful avant-documentary that needs to be seen widely.

Adieu Godard, Adieu Cinema

Scénarios + Exposé du Film annonce du film "Scénario" (2024) - Godard Jean Luc Godard's last, 17 minute film, Sénarios, which was completed just a day before his 2022 assisted suicide death, is paired with the 36 minute 'making of' documentary for this year's New York Film Festival. For the fans of the late master it is an emotional one. Because it's the last material to see and hear him on screen in his very last days. Originally planned as a feature, this long gestating project had been constantly worked on, even during Covid lockdown. With his failing health, Godard truncated the four part project into two chapters - DNA: Fundamental Elements and MRI: Odyssey. The message is also simplified and more direct. "The final warning," uttered on several occasions to whatever Godard saw as impending for us.

You can tell that the end was on his mind. Images of death, the violent ones at that are displayed - Pina (Anna Magnani)'s Death in Rosselini's Rome, Open City, car wreck that ends Contempt and the infamous car pile up in Week End (both from his own filmography). So are the images of war. Like the DNA itself- the base, the beginning element for all living creatures, Godard here equates the old film clips as what cinema is based upon. The distinctive sound MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging - a modern medical technology of scanning your body for grave illness) machine makes- the beeping, the loud thuds, are incorporated into the latter part of the film. Not new to the procedure at that point in life, Godard signals the end. Beginning and end, of life and cinema, at least his own, ending as well.

Sénarios exhibits primary colors boldly painted on stock papers over the images and words - the technique he used in his later periods with Image Book and the last year's posthumous release, Trailer of the Film That Will Never Exist: Phony Wars. The colors,shapes, texture painted over collages, Godard was in full late period Mattise mode. At the end, we are shown his exposed old man's hairy torso, as he puffs away his cigar with wild white hair, reading Sartre's aphorism "Using a horse to illustrate that a horse is not a horse is less efficient than using a non-horse to illustrate that a horse is not a horse." I keep wondering what he would make of the current state of the world - The war in Ukraine and Gaza, the rise of misinformation, the world in chaos.

The making of documentary that follows Scénarios, confirms my assumption about the Mattise comparison. Mattise, wheelchair bound and with physical limitations in his final years, turned to a new type of medium, with the help of his assistants, he began creating paper cut collages (decoupage). Godard, filmed by his long time collaborator Fabrice Argano in 2021, gives detailed instructions on, then, a planned 4 part feature on stock paper cards, what to include, what to cut and what to modify in terms of images, music, colors and what sequences. With a lighter in his hand, we get the rare glimpse of his working method in his last years. It's an invaluable and emotional viewing for the fans of cinema at large.

Rebel Rebel

L'eau froide (1994) - Assayas Baby-faced Gilles (Cyprien Fouquet) and Christine (Virginie Ledoyen) are always in trouble. When they steal stacks of records at the music store, Christine ends up getting caught. She pulls some wild stories at the police station about a store security guard mistreating her sexually. Their parents don't know what to do with them. Christine's dad, who owns a hardware store, sends her to a mental asylum. He's done it before. Gilles, who's from a more privileged background, will be sent to a boarding school if his shenanigans keep up. Christine's mom and her boyfriend chastise Gilles;It might be a silly game for him, but for Christine, he is toying with her life.

Christine breaks out of the asylum, ends at the party in the woods where young ones hang out. There's Bonfire, drugs, alcohol and music. Christine asks if Gilles wants to run away with her to some artist colony that her friends live in. There won't be running water or electricity or phones. It will just be her and him. He hesitates first, then says yes.

Always in tight close up with a handheld camera, Assayas creates a raw, intimate portrayal of young rebels without a cause. Their pledges of love and promises seem as fleeting as the water stream Christine bathes in. L'eau froide, epitomizes the adolescent genre French cinema is known for. Ledoyen has the same rawness and volatility of Sandrine Bonnaire in A nous amours and stunning in her youthful beauty. The fitting soundtrack consists of many of the 60s rebel anthems by Joplin, Dylan, Cohen, Twisted Sisters and more.