Acting
In late 19th century France, the Countess Louise, wife of a wealthy general, sells the earrings her husband gave her on their wedding day to pay off her secret debts, then claims to have lost them. Her husband quickly learns of the deceit, which is the beginning of many tragic misunderstandings, all involving the earrings, the general, the countess, and her new lover, the Italian Baron Donati.
Out of prison after a five-year stretch, jewel thief Tony turns down a quick job his friend Jo offers him, until he discovers that his old girlfriend Mado has become the lover of local gangster Pierre Grutter during Tony's absence. Expanding a minor smash-and-grab into a full-scale jewel heist, Tony and his crew appear to get away clean, but their actions after the job is completed threaten the lives of everyone involved.
French silent film pioneer Abel Gance directs this 1935 classic about Lucrezia Borgia, her brother, Cesare. and her father, Pope Alexander VI -- one of history's most ruthless and ambitious crime families.
A biopic of Napoleon Bonaparte, tracing the Corsican's career from his schooldays (where a snowball fight is staged like a military campaign) to his flight from Corsica, through the French Revolution (where a real storm is intercut with a political storm) and the Terror, culminating in his triumphant invasion of Italy in 1797.
Lola Montes, previously a great adventuress, is reduced to being the attraction of a circus after having been the lover of various important men.
Originally titled Nous Sommes Tout des Assassins, We Are All Murderers was directed by Andre Cayette, a former lawyer who detested France's execution system. Charles Spaak's screenplay makes no attempt to launder the four principal characters (Marcel Mouloudji, Raymond Pellegrin, Antoinine Balpetre, Julien Verdeir): never mind the motivations, these are all hardened murderers. Still, the film condemns the sadistic ritual through which these four men are brought to the guillotine. In France, the policy is to never tell the condemned man when the execution will occur--and then to show up without warning and drag the victim kicking and screaming to his doom, without any opportunity to make peace with himself or his Maker. By the end of this harrowing film, the audience feels as dehumanized as the four "protagonists." We Are All Murderers was roundly roasted by the French law enforcement establishment, but it won a special jury prize at the 1952 Cannes Film Festival.
On the morning of 30 January 1889, the Archduke Rodolphe de Habsbourg and his mistress Marie Vetsera are found dead. The remains of Rodolphe are discreetly repatriated to Hofburg, while those of Marie are hastily thrown disposed into the depths of a tomb.
After resolving to start a new life with his girlfriend Jacqueline, Bastien Sassey decides to give up working as a courier for drugs traffickers. So that he and Jacqueline can make a fresh start he agrees to take on one more job for a large sum of cash, but he betrays his employer.
Prosecutor Etzel discovers that his father has sentenced a man, Leonardo Maurizius, on mere presumptions. He then makes it a point of honor to trace the sources of the case to uncover the truth.
Fernand Espitalion is miserable as totally whipped husband of a dragon 'passed on' -like cloths- by his late cousin. She often leaves him waiting outside like a dog when she does business. While she sees a notary about an inheritance, he's seduced to a bar by a shady man. The rogue gets Fernand drunk, knocks him out and switches costumes and papers. He's now Robert Durand, a voluntary Foreign legion recruit. After failed attempts to explain, he tastes military life and finds it less disciplined and more enjoyable then, marriage. But will that last when his wife tracks him and his unit is sent to action in tribal Algeria?
A brave woman is sentenced to prison on false testimony. She escapes twenty years later and takes refuge in Paris where she carries bread while looking for her children Georges and Lucie who will find her and exonerate her.
Sophie Dirondel, history teacher at the Saint-Cloison-sur-Ermoise, wins the jackpot of a lottery, a 2CV. The good-natured woman is both happy and slightly upset, as she doe not have her driving-license. But she decides to take driving lessons and although she does not prove very gifted she manages to pass the test. She grasps the opportunity to achieve one of her sweetest dreams and, proudly sitting behind her wheel, heads for the City of Light. Alone in Paris, she gets to know Victor Martini, a smooth operator. The man who, in real fact, is the leader of a gang, has no problem bamboozling the naive woman.
Juanillo is in love with Dolores, the daughter of the owner of an inn. He likes to sing, she likes dancing. After the village festivals, where Juanillo has acted as a bullfighter and Dolores has performed, he has been hired as bullfighter for a tour in America. They exchange vows, but their letters will be intercepted.
During the Second World War, midshipman Dourdan, nicknamed 'Saucisse', distinguished himself by his clumsiness and his blunders. Charged with Lieutenant Goldfinch to convey an aircraft to Marrakech, he shot down an American bomber on the way, mistaken for a German plane.
During the First World War, before joining a squadron at the front in 1918, Herbillon (Jean-Pierre Aumont) has a liaison with Helene (Annabella), a married woman. The young man discovers that his mistress is none other than the wife of Maury (Charles Vanel), an aviator friend.
At a mine on the shared edge of France and Germany, an underground explosion leads to the entrapment of a group of French miners. In an effort to save the trapped Frenchmen, German miners Wittkopp and Kasper take it upon themselves to traverse a crumbling war tunnel leading down into the mines. Yet, though the workers harbor no political biases against one another, their callous, less tolerant bosses hope to halt this cross-cultural rescue mission.
Fates of multiple otherwise disconnected characters intertwine miraculously under the sky of Paris. And it all happens in one day.
During the Occupation, Cora takes the place of her dead husband at the head of a Resistance network. One evening, she sympathizes with Bernard, a Swiss journalist. However, he is actually an undercover German officer who is close to the man ordered to find her using an Identikit picture...
A gang of drug pushers is rampant on the French Riviera. The police has been informed and arrests an accomplice who is about to collect the drugs dropped off from a yacht. This person happens to be a public figure of a nearby village...
Bavaria, 1433. Reason of state rules that Prince Albert is to marry Princess Bertha of Wurtemberg. But the fine-looking young man is loath to become the husband of a woman with pimples,flat feet and no breast. Nevertheless, he has to obey his authoritarian father, Duke Ernest, and accompanied by faithful Count Törring, he mounts his steed and sets out for Würtemberg. Stopping in Augsburg, he falls in love with the daughter of a local barber-surgeon, pure and beautiful Agnès Bernauer. The couple is soon secretly married and both take refuge at the castle of Margravine Josepha, Albert's aunt, waiting for Ernest's consent. Unluckily Albert's father will not accept his son's union with a commoner and Albert, supported by Josepha and an army of common people, declares war on the Duke. They seem about to be victorious when Brother Enrique, a monk formerly in the Holy Inquisition, finds a way to reverse the situation: accusing Agnès of witchcraft...
