French-German film series - Spring 2007
The French Stanford Student Association (FSSA) and the Stanford German Student Association (SGSA) are offering a joing film series during the Spring quarter 2007. Good German and French movies will be shown at the Bechtel I-Center in the dining room, Thursday at 7:30pm. Please note that there will be no movie shown May 17 due to the International week. Snacks will also be offered. Everybody welcome, entrance is free. English subtitles are shown.
This film series is sponsored by the Achilles Fund and the Bechtel I-Center.
Movie List
All movies are shown in the dining room of the Bechtel I-Center at 7:30pm.
4/05/07 - De battre mon coeur s'est arrêté (the beat my heart skipped) - IMDB
This movie, directed by Jacques Audiard and featuring Romain Duris, won 8 Césars (the French Oscar) in 2006 including best movie. Short summary: Twenty-eight-year-old Tom leads a life that might be termed as criminal. In doing so, he follows in the footsteps of his father, who made his money from dirty, and sometimes brutal, real estate deals. Tom is a pretty hard-boiled guy but also strangely considerate as far as his father is concerned. Somehow he appears to have arrived at a critical juncture in his life when a chance encounter prompts him to take up the piano and become a concert pianist, like his mother. He senses that this might be his final opportunity to take back his life.
4/12/07 - Das Boot (The Boat) - IMDB
It is 1942 and the German submarine fleet is heavily engaged in the so called "Battle of the Atlantic" to harass and destroy English shipping. With better escorts of the Destroyer Class, however, German U-Boats have begun to take heavy losses. "Das Boot" is the story of one such U-Boat crew, with the film examining how these submariners maintained their professionalism as soldiers, attempted to accomplish impossible missions, while all the time attempting to understand and obey the ideology of the government under which they served.
4/19/07 - Ascenseur pour l'échafaud (Elevator to the Gallows) - IMDB
Julien Tavernier kills his lover's husband but is trapped in the lift to his offices. Meanwhile, his car is stolen by a young man who signs into a hotel, with his girlfriend, under Julien's name. During the stay at the hotel, the young man shoots a German couple with a gun he found earlier in Tavernier's car, and goes on the run. When Tavernier finally manages to escape from the lift in which he was forced to spend the weekend, he is arrested by the police and charged with the murder of the German couple. His lover, Florence, manages to track down the real murders and obtains the evidence needed to clear Julien. But in so doing, she unwittingly incriminates him in the murder of her husband. What makes this a particularly memorable film are the totally compelling performances from Jeanne Moreau and Maurice Ronet, both luminaries of French cinema, and some amazing background music (improvised by jazz performer Miles Davis whilst watching the film).
4/26/07 - Good Bye Lenin! - IMDB
East Germany, the year 1989: A young man protests against the regime. His mother watches the police arresting him and suffers a heart attack and falls into a coma. Some months later, the GDR does not exist anymore and the mother awakes. Since she has to avoid every excitement, the son tries to set up the GDR again for her in their flat. But the world has changed a lot...
5/03/07 - Triplettes de Belleville - IMDB
Madame Souza raises her grandson Champion and tries to make him happier with a baby dog, Bruno. However, the boy remains sad, and the grandmother gives a tricycle for him. The boy gets excited with the gift, and trained by Madame Souza along the years, he finally competes the Tour de France. When Champion is kidnapped by two MIBs from the French mafia, Madame Souza and Bruno travel to Belleville to rescue him, with the support of the elder singers, the Belleville Sisters.
5/10/07 - Die fetten Jahre sind vorbei (The Edukators) - IMDB
The film "The Edukadors" follows three idealistic activists living in present day Germany. When Jule gets evicted and is forced to move in with her boyfriend Peter and his slightly aloof introverted roommate Jan, she finds out about Jan and Peter's secret identity. this finding leads the three into a chain of dangerous events which leaves them as a love triangle. Brilliantly filmed and written. It's very rare that character's can develop fully in a film. The Edukadors presents three people trying to get by in a corrupt world.
5/17/07 - International Week - No Movie
5/24/07 - Comme une Image (Look at Me) - IMDB
Lolita, plump, in her 20s, desperately wants her father's attention. He's egotistical, a famous writer and publisher with an attractive wife little older than Lolita. She's in a choir, rehearsing for a concert; she's given her father a tape, which he's yet to listen to. Sylvia, a voice coach, is willing to help the group, knowing she'll have a chance to get her husband's new novel in front of Lolita's father. For Lolita, this is a pattern: people pay attention to her to gain access to him, something she fears is the intent of Sébastien, a struggling journalist who may become her boyfriend. The night of the concert, the music may bring out everyone's feelings.
5/31/07 - Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others) - IMDB
In the early 1980s, the successful dramatist Georg Dreyman and his longtime companion Christa-Maria Sieland, a popular actress, are big intellectual stars in the socialist state, although they secretly don't always think loyal to the party line. One day, the Minister of Culture becomes interested in Christa, so the secret service agent Wiesler is instructed to observe and sound out the couple, but their life fascinates him more and more...