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PARADISE: MY JOURNEY THROUGH FRENCH CINEMA

If you love film you can’t afford to miss the experience of seeing Bertrand Tavernier’s Journey Through French Cinema, especially on a theater screen. When I first saw it at the Telluride Film Festival last fall I was wary of its extreme length (over three hours) and an early-morning time slot. I needn’t have worried: I was glued to the screen from start to finish and when it was over I wanted more!

Tavernier is a master storyteller, as he has proven in such films as The Clockmaker, Coup de Torchon, A Sunday in the Country, ‘Round Midnightand Safe Passage, to name just a few. This endeavor is an expansive, highly personal view of French films from the 1930s onward, as seen through his eyes. He discusses his youthful moviegoing experiences, his later work alongside Jacques Becker and Jean-Pierre Melville (detailing their peccadilloes), and his conversations with such towering figures as Jean Gabin. A child of World War Two, he points fingers at talented directors who did not behave admirably during that turbulent time. This is a tapestry of French cinema like no other. (The only film that compares to it is his friend and colleague Martin Scorsese’s My Voyage to Italy.)

You will encounter acknowledged classics like Grand Illusion, The Rules of the Game, Children of Paradise, Bob Le Flambeur, and Le Samourai, but you will notice things you never truly saw before because of the context Tavernier provides. You will also be introduced to films that are less familiar, along with their creators—Edmond T. Gréville, Claude Autant-Lara, and such once-famous figures as Marcel Carne, Henri Verneuil, and the great Julien Duvivier.

My Journey Through French Cinema will make you want to see every movie that’s excerpted in its entirety. Never fear: Tavernier is hard at work trying to persuade distributors to restore and reissue many titles and hoping to issue some of their music scores as well.

I’ve always had a soft spot in my heart for French cinema; perhaps that’s why this survey affected me as it did. But then, the French have a unique relationship with film. No one could possibly express that sentiment better than Monsieur Tavernier. I will quote from the press notes for My Journey Through French Cinema:

“Working as a citizen, a spy, an explorer and painter, a chronicler and adventurer, as it is so well described by so many authors, from Casanova to Gilles Perrault…isn’t that a fine definition of the job of a filmmaker? That one would like to apply to Renoir, Becker, the Vigo of L’ATALANTE, Grangier, Greìville or Sacha, who, in a scene or film, illumine an emotion, or uncover surprising truths. I would like this film to be an expression of gratitude to all those filmmakers, screenwriters, actors, and musicians who have erupted into my life. Memory keeps us warm: this film is a piece of glowing charcoal for a winter night.” 

My Voyage Through French Cinema opens today at the Quad Cinema in New York City and the Laemmle Royal in Los Angeles. To learn more about where and when it will be playing near you, click HERE

Leonard Maltin is one of the world’s most respected film critics and historians. He is best known for his widely-used reference work Leonard Maltin’s Movie Guide and its companion volume Leonard Maltin’s Classic Movie Guide, now in its third edition, as well as his thirty-year run on television’s Entertainment Tonight. He teaches at the USC School of Cinematic Arts and appears regularly on Reelz Channel and Turner Classic Movies. His books include The 151 Best Movies You’ve Never Seen, Of Mice and Magic: A History of American Animated Cartoons, The Great Movie Comedians, The Disney Films, The Art of the Cinematographer, Movie Comedy Teams, The Great American Broadcast, and Leonard Maltin’s Movie Encyclopedia. He served two terms as President of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, is a voting member of the National Film Registry, and was appointed by the Librarian of Congress to sit on the Board of Directors of the National Film Preservation Foundation. He hosted and co-produced the popular Walt Disney Treasures DVD series and has appeared on innumerable television programs and documentaries. He has been the recipient of awards from the American Society of Cinematographers, the Telluride Film Festival, Anthology Film Archives, and San Diego’s Comic-Con International. Perhaps the pinnacle of his career was his appearance in a now-classic episode of South Park. (Or was it Carmela consulting his Movie Guide on an episode of The Sopranos?) He holds court at leonardmaltin.com. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook; you can also listen to him on his weekly podcast: Maltin on Movies. — [Artwork by Drew Friedman]

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