16 Le vendredi 19 septembre 1997 allons déferler sur le Quartier latin, remplacer l’eau de la fontaine Saint Michel par de la biére.... La, en prélude a nos fétes « Nous, barbares, dionysiaques... nous bra- lerons Chateaubriand, Corneille (oui ! oui !) et Jules Barbant d’Aurevilly en un immense autodafé... Keith Richards nous servira le plus grand solo de guitare de Vhistoire du rock’n roll, celui SEPT =26 Clubbed to Death (France, 90 min.) A kind of contemporary Alice in Wonderland, Yolande Zauberman’s latest recreates the continental rave scene with electrifying imme- diacy and dreamlike sensuality. While the film is essentially a love story about Lola, a 20- year-old who falls asleep on a bus and ends up at huge nightclub, it features a surreal nocturnal atmosphere created by superb hand-held camera work and a knockout soundtrack featuring Massive Attack, Robdy and other trip-hop and techno artists. Just for Laughs (France, 100 min.) In this tight, polished drawing-room comedy, Lucas Belvaux turns the conventions upside-down, leaving us wondering if we should do the same thing with our smiles. Jean-Pierre Léaud gives his best performance yet as a sensitive househusband who, discovering his wife’s (the engaging Omella Muti as a hot- shot lawyer) affair, attempts to turn the tables, making the lovers the pawns in the game. A Summer’s Tale (France, 113 min.) The work of a master filmmaker, in which every scene is a lesson in precision and every moment meaningful, the third in Eric Rohmer’s “Tales of the Four Seasons” cycle is one of the most beautifully realized works in years. Shot in the vacation resorts of the Brittany coast, and evoking Pauline at the Beach, it is the tale of a 20-year-old man negotiating a tricky path between three very different women. de Sympathy for the Devil... Invasion des profanateurs... sacré scénario... >» Ces propos de Paul Yonnet, en réponse aux chantres de luniversalisme forcené, auraient pu étre tenus par Régis Painchaud, l’or- ganisateur, en 1976, a Montréal, de la Semaine internationale de la contre- culture. Auparavant, la bande & Régis avait mis sur pied, afin de faire connaitre au public les oeuvres des « clandestins de la culture », toute une série d’événements : la Semaine du film sur les tablettes qui avait pour but de présenter les films censurés ou _ considérés comme des navets, la Semaine du film artisanal, les Journées du cinéma différent en Suisse, _ en Belgique et en France. Régis Painchaud _ est arrivé en Colombie-Britan- nique en 1984. « J’ai suivi a Vancouver mon fils et ma compagne d’alors qui est venue enseigner & luniversité Simon Fraser. Je comptais y rester deux ou trois ans, le temps d’apprendre l’anglais. Mais, comme tout le monde, je suis tombé en amour avec cette ville. Pendant mes premiéres années a Vancouver, je retournais plusieurs fois par an a Montréal pour me ressourcer, pour retrouver ma_ vie artistique et nocturne. » La création de la Maison de la francophonie — est intimement liée 4 la personne de Vancien directeur du Centre culturel francophone, Régis Painchaud. « Quand je suis arrivé 4 Vancouver, j'ai tout de suite constaté le caractére inadéquat des locaux francophones. Ceux-ci étaient éparpillés un peu partout dans la ville. J'ai done eu Vidée de les regrouper dans un méme lieu. Nous voulions créer dans la 16e avenue une rue aussi francophone que les rues chinoises du quartier chinois. Une Maison qui nous ‘ressemble et qui nous rassemble. L’ actuelle Maison de la francophonie est plus un centre administratif qu’un centre culturel. » Régis Painchaud est dans le milieu artistique depuis son adolescence. « J’ai lancé ma premiére boite 4 chansons, le Sortilége, quand j’avais 15 ans. Cela se passait dans ma ville natale, Arvida (Jonquiére). » Il est également le fondateur de |’Atelier d’expression multidisci- plinaire et du Centre d’essai Conventum 4 Montréal. Le THE 16th VANCOUVER INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL OC T.4 Every Little Thing (France, 105 min.) Every summer the residents of an uncannily idyllic French psychiatric hospital put on a highly regarded stage production, and over the summer of 1995, Nicolas Philibert (Louvre City, In the Land of the Deaf) documented the rehearsals and performance of Opérette by Argentine modernist Witold Gombrowicz. Philibert, with a gentle lyrical sensitivity, draws us out of our preconceptions and into the patients’ truly extraordinary world. The Life of Jesus (France, 96 min.) A film about love and hate, and their power, this luminous and disconcerting feature debut from Bruno Dumont is an uncompromising portrait of thwarted emotions and small-town tedium, centering on the life of 20-year-old Freddy, his four pals and his girlfriend. Set in Bailleul, Dumont succeeds in establishing a rock-solid sense of place and in drawing out convincing and touching performances from a cast of non-professionals. Winner of the prestigious Prix Jean Vigo 1997. ‘Will It Snow for Christmas? (France, 90 min.) A remarkable, almost neo-realist film about a rural mother and her seven illegiti- mate children, Sandrine Veysset’s highly acclaimed feature debut is a “homage to maternal art.” It is also a strikingly honest and hence rare depiction of the hardships, pover- ty and pleasures of country life, told through a series of atmospheric vignettes so detailed and raw you can smell the dust in the sum- mer air. Special Jury Prize, 1996 Paris Film Festival. La Conciergerie*(Canada, 108 min.) Louis 19 director Miche! Poulette returns with a film noir. detective thriller about Jacques Laniel (Serge Dupire), a man with nothing left to lose. The young detective is an ex-police offi- cer who lost his partner and best friend (mur- dered) and was deserted by his wife. Investigating a brutal murder, Laniel stumbles into La Conciergerie, a large building housing a bizarre hornet's nest of strange characters, each of whom has something to hide. Nenette et Boni (France, 1996) Aided by the atmospheric soundtrack of England’s beloved The Tindersticks, Claire Denis (Chocolate, | Can't Sleep) gives us her richest work to date. A Marseille pizza worker with a rich masturba- tory fantasy life, finds his 15-year-old sister on his doorstep, pregnant. Proving Denis is one of the most talented auteurs of her generation, the film reveals not only her trademark sensu- al, tactile filmmaking, but also daring experi- mentation. Golden Leopard for Best Film, 1996 Locarno Film Festival. L'Homme perché (Canada, 67 min.) A bitter- sweet comic fable about a man who, having decided it's time to die, wants to spend his last days up in a tree. His family and local authorities don't think this is such a great idea. Director Stefan Pleszczynski has invented a pleasing cinematic universe in L'Homme perché, and a graceful contempla- tion of what individual liberty really means in a world gone mad with professional fixers. Genealogies of a Crime (France, 113 min.) The delicious, ironic wit of director Raul Ruiz (his Three Lives and Only One Death is also in this year’s festival) is given free reign in this Chinese puzzle of a film. Catherine Deneuve commands centre stage, playing both a psychiatrist convinced that her young nephew will grow up to be a killer and the tough lawyer, years later, who defends the nephew against the charge that he murdered his aunt... Michel Piccoli also stars. La rencontre (France, 75 min.) Among the most formal and innovative fillmakers today, Alain Cavalier turns to the video diary format (since transferred to 35mm) in this ode to the beauty of his new love and the magic of the first year of their relationship. Cavalier’s pas- sionate belief in the ability of everyday detail to contain profundity carries the film into the realm of pure poetry. “Anybody could have made this film; finally someone did!”—Peter Scarlett, San Francisco Film Festival Three Lives and Only One. Death (France/Portugal, 123 min.) The late great Marcello Mastroianni masters four roles in Raul Ruiz’s highly entertaining, neo-surrealist take on split personalities, the art of story- telling, magic and the Maastricht treaty. It's Paris in August and we are lead into mysteri- ous comedy as four different stories highlight Mastroianni’s different personalities. Also starring the lovely Anna Galiena, Marisa Paredes and Chiara Mastroianni, Variety called it “eminently enjoyable.” Theatres: Caprice, Cinématheque, Ridge, Robson Square, and Vancouver Centre Conventum fut transformé plus tard en un théatre de 165 places. Entre 1973 et 1983, on y a présenté plus de 500 spectacles. Les Rendez-vous du cinéma québécois de Vancouver, dont la premiére édition remonte A 1994, doivent leur existence a Régis Painchaud. « La 5e édition, dit-il, en sera une de transition. Les Rendez-vous seront du cinéma québécois et francophone, pour devenir, dés la 6e édition, les Rendez-vous du ceux cinéma francophone, tout simplement. » Sauver Vespace Dubreuil. Telle est la pro- chaine bataille qu’entend mener Régis Painchaud. II ne veut pas laisser la ville de Vancouver, propriétaire des lieux, détruire cet espace qu'il a aménagé avec son ami Alain Dubreuil. Vous avez dit activiste de la culture... ? LipassE NIANG Irma Vep (France, 98 min.) In a change of pace from one of France's most gifted film- makers, Olivier Assayas turns to sly comedy. This light-hearted film was written for Hong Kong star Maggie Cheung, who plays herself as an actor come to Paris to play the black latex-clad jewel thief Irma Vep, in a remake of Louis Feuillade’s 1915 serial Les Vampires. A furiously paced satire on filmmaking, it recalls the acid commentary of Day for Night and Living in Oblivion. A Self-Made Hero (France, 105 min.) Jacques Audiard’s superbly slick comedy- drama — about a young deceiver who assumes the mantle of Resistance hero in the wake of WWII — is a witty, intelligent and, finally, very touching exploration of the seduc- tive allure of fame and the true nature of hero- ism. One of the best films of the year from ' France, starring Mathieu Kassovitz (director of Hate) and Jean-Louis Trintignant. Tu as crié Let Me Go (Canada, 98 min.) Anne Claire Poirier's documentary is a pow- erful, courageous and touching poem dedi- cated to her daughter, Yanne, a heroin addict who was found strangled in a back street of Montreal. This is a mother's quest for truth and understanding, as a veteran filmmaker tries to recreate the last moments of her daughter's tragically short life. Passes and Tickets on Sale Now at the Virgin Megastore and Rogers Video (Arbutus + Broadway) or Charge by Phone: 685-8297 (Diners Club/en Route, Mastercard, VISA). For more details check out our Souvenir Program ($2.00 at better bookstores) or Web Site: http://viff.org/viff/ 275 Films from 40 Countries