Streaming now in various virtual cinemas in new restorations, Éric Rohmer’s “Tales of the Four Seasons,” the last of his three major film cycles, offers a fresh chance to consider the methods of one of cinema’s most quietly perceptive artists. Compared to his “Six Moral Tales” and “Comedies and Proverbs,” films that probed the strident yet misplaced confidence of young people as they attempt to find their place in the world, the “Tales of the Four Seasons” found Rohmer—70 years old the year that the first film in the series, 1990’s A Tale of Springtime, premiered—turning his attentions to middle-aged characters.
Perhaps for that reason, this is the most narratively driven cycle in Rohmer’s oeuvre, focusing on characters who may still show flashes of impertinence but generally have a far more solid grasp of self than the pseudo-intellectuals and flighty dreamers of his earlier work. This...
Perhaps for that reason, this is the most narratively driven cycle in Rohmer’s oeuvre, focusing on characters who may still show flashes of impertinence but generally have a far more solid grasp of self than the pseudo-intellectuals and flighty dreamers of his earlier work. This...
- 2/14/2024
- by Jake Cole
- Slant Magazine
Melvil Poupaud began his 40-year career, at the age of 10 Photo: Thomas Brunot/UniFrance Following in the illustrious wake of talents including Juliette Binoche, Virginie Efira, Olivier Assayas and Olivier Nakache and Éric Toledano, it is the turn of actor Melvil Poupaud to be honoured during the UniFrance Rendezvous with French Cinema in Paris later this month.
He will be given the French Cinema Award during a glittering ceremony at the French Ministry of Culture at a ceremony on 18 January.
Poupaud’s career has stretched across almost four decades, having begun his acting debut at the age of ten in City Of Pirates, directed by Raoul Ruiz, with whom he went on to make a further five critically acclaimed films.
Melvil Poupaud and Amanda Langlet in Eric Rohmer’s A Summer’s Tale Photo: Les Films du Losange During his career Poupaud has worked with many of France's most respected directors,...
He will be given the French Cinema Award during a glittering ceremony at the French Ministry of Culture at a ceremony on 18 January.
Poupaud’s career has stretched across almost four decades, having begun his acting debut at the age of ten in City Of Pirates, directed by Raoul Ruiz, with whom he went on to make a further five critically acclaimed films.
Melvil Poupaud and Amanda Langlet in Eric Rohmer’s A Summer’s Tale Photo: Les Films du Losange During his career Poupaud has worked with many of France's most respected directors,...
- 1/6/2024
- by Richard Mowe
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Summer Shanty: Rohmer’s Breezy Contemplation a Welcome Resurrection
Never before released in the Us, Eric Rohmer’s 1996 title, A Summer’s Tale, which is part of his Tales of the Four Seasons cycle, finally arrives for a seasonally appropriate theatrical run. A chatty, observational exercise, it’s a humorously playful film with the director’s usual examination of lovelorn humans and their amusing interactions. As such, it’s a very welcome resuscitation, albeit nearly twenty years after the fact, from a cherished filmmaker who passed away in 2010.
Starring a mop-headed Melvil Poupaud as a young adult, this is a delectable performance from the actor, a perfomer since a preadolescent who has become a prolific presence in and outside of French cinema, headlining titles from Francois Ozon, Xavier Dolan, and Zoe Cassavetes. Intelligent, contemplative conversation and amusing interactions transpire effortlessly and with continual interest, as per usual in Rohmer’s fashion.
Never before released in the Us, Eric Rohmer’s 1996 title, A Summer’s Tale, which is part of his Tales of the Four Seasons cycle, finally arrives for a seasonally appropriate theatrical run. A chatty, observational exercise, it’s a humorously playful film with the director’s usual examination of lovelorn humans and their amusing interactions. As such, it’s a very welcome resuscitation, albeit nearly twenty years after the fact, from a cherished filmmaker who passed away in 2010.
Starring a mop-headed Melvil Poupaud as a young adult, this is a delectable performance from the actor, a perfomer since a preadolescent who has become a prolific presence in and outside of French cinema, headlining titles from Francois Ozon, Xavier Dolan, and Zoe Cassavetes. Intelligent, contemplative conversation and amusing interactions transpire effortlessly and with continual interest, as per usual in Rohmer’s fashion.
- 6/21/2014
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
A Summer’s Tale
Not Rated, 1 Hr., 54 Mins.
Originally released in 1996 in France (but never before in the U.S.), Eric Rohmer’s sun-kissed love quadrangle remains as fresh and romantically profound as it was 18 years ago. Melvil Poupaud plays Gaspard, a mopey young man who heads to a seaside resort in Brittany looking for a girl…and ends up finding three. Quelle chance! It’s obvious from the start that Amanda Langlet’s pixieish Margot is the One, especially after a series of long platonic walks and soul-searching talks. But Rohmer would rather torture the poor cad for not...
Not Rated, 1 Hr., 54 Mins.
Originally released in 1996 in France (but never before in the U.S.), Eric Rohmer’s sun-kissed love quadrangle remains as fresh and romantically profound as it was 18 years ago. Melvil Poupaud plays Gaspard, a mopey young man who heads to a seaside resort in Brittany looking for a girl…and ends up finding three. Quelle chance! It’s obvious from the start that Amanda Langlet’s pixieish Margot is the One, especially after a series of long platonic walks and soul-searching talks. But Rohmer would rather torture the poor cad for not...
- 6/20/2014
- by EW staff
- EW - Inside Movies
The late New Wave auteur Eric Rohmer equated his films to novels — that's what auteur means, after all — and A Summer's Tale feels like a great beach read of a movie, that deceptively slender paperback you tuck into your luggage because it's substantial without weighing much.
The plot of this 1996 film, newly restored and in its first American theatrical release, seems quaintly simple: On a Brittany beach-town holiday, a moody math student (Melvil Poupaud) waits to meet his girlfriend (Aurélia Nolin), meanwhile making a friend (Amanda Langlet) who wants to set him up with her friend (Gwenaëlle Simon).
The ensuing complications play out as a perfectly minimal farce, with edges planed so smooth as to be almost invisible. Days and moods pass...
The plot of this 1996 film, newly restored and in its first American theatrical release, seems quaintly simple: On a Brittany beach-town holiday, a moody math student (Melvil Poupaud) waits to meet his girlfriend (Aurélia Nolin), meanwhile making a friend (Amanda Langlet) who wants to set him up with her friend (Gwenaëlle Simon).
The ensuing complications play out as a perfectly minimal farce, with edges planed so smooth as to be almost invisible. Days and moods pass...
- 6/18/2014
- Village Voice
The wonderful late summer Lincoln Center retrospective "The Sign of Rohmer" would require a book-length study to give a reasonable account of the many layers of Rohmer's filmmaking, and of the surprising variety of emotions and behavior that one finds beneath the surface consistency of his material. Instead of that book, I offer a memory of the final impressions that the series made on me: of two intense scenes from two dissimilar films shown in the last days of the Walter Reade program. In one film, Rohmer uses bleak, snowy landscapes and unaesthetic working-class interiors as the backdrop for the single strongest affirmation of a character in his work. In the other, a light-comic tone and an idyllic vacation ambience culminate in emptiness and desolation.
About two-thirds of the way into Conte d'hiver (A Tale of Winter) (1992), Rohmer tips off the origin of his story idea by sending his working-class...
About two-thirds of the way into Conte d'hiver (A Tale of Winter) (1992), Rohmer tips off the origin of his story idea by sending his working-class...
- 10/18/2010
- MUBI
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