Helene is based on Helene Wilfur, a novel by Vicki (Grand Hotel) Baum. Madeleine Renaud essays the title role, a young medical student in love with aspiring musician Pierre Regnier (Jean-Lous Barrault). Pierre's father, a noted surgeon, puts pressure on his son to give up music in favor of...
Jean-Paul is a Frenchman who yearns to live in communist Czechoslovakia. His wish is granted when, mistaken as a masseur of a French boating team, he manages to elude the democratic authorities long enough to scamper over the Czech border.
The good guys win out in this sweet tale about a young orphan who is abused for much of her life but who eventually finds happiness when she marries an honest man who extricates her from her situation.
"Altitude 3.200" asks the question and provides the premise of what would happen if a group of young people----poor, rich, discontented, bored--- were given an idyllic community in which to live. Call it a colony. Call it a village. Call it one-world. Mainly call it a futile exercise in changing...
A renowned doctor and his brother live and work together until the brother falls in love with Marie, a singer, and gives up medicine to be with her. After a time however, she misses her old life and goes back on the stage - an act which leads her lover to commit suicide. Later the doctor and Marie...
This portrait of the French film theorist and avant-garde director Jean Epstein (1897-1953) concentrates on the period when he filmed in Brittany, the spot where he became inspired by the sea. Using rare archive footage, Jean Epstein, Young Oceans of Cinema also looks at Epstein’s views on the...
Filmed in French Morocco, Itto's dialogue is spoken primarily in the tribal Chleuh language. The jingoistic story concerns a series of clashes between French occupational forces and a rebellious Chleuh chieftain. Itto (Simone Berriau), chief's daughter, becomes embroiled in a romance with a...
Two young doctors, surprised by the storm, take refuge in an inn. A diamond broker joins them and, for lack of space, shares their room. At dawn he is found dead. A few years later justice is done.
A mother sells a photo of her daughter to the press for publicity, and a daughter suddenly dies leaving the mother desperate surrounding by portraits of her daughter all around town.
When her father files bankruptcy and then dies, Rose's fiancé jilts her; she takes a job as a maid in a Montmartre kindergarten with 150 poor children. Rose gives each child loving attention, and soon she's their favorite. An especially needy child is Marie, a prostitute's daughter. Rose and she...
On his way out of a wedding, a young boy named Peacheskin finds a jewel by chance. Bringing it back to its owner, she becomes his benefactress in the years that pass...At the end of a wedding, a young boy named peau de pêche finds by chance a jewel. Bringing it back to its owner, she becomes his...
As its title indicates, La Mort du Cygne (The Dying Swan) is set in the special world of the ballet. Young dance student Janine Charrat idolizes her teacher-role-model Yvette Chauvire, and will do anything to help Chauvire further herself.
Jacques Prémont-Solène is a degenerate gambler and his losses at baccarat have bankrupted his lover, Laure Maresco. When he steals four hundred thousand francs and loses that at the gambling tables, he flees to the United States, and Nathalie takes the blame. Twenty years later, she has a...