Few European cinematographies are presently as diverse, variable and attractive as the one produced by France, where, obeying a tradition dating back to the new wave and its most immediate offshoots, generationally-linked names come together with others who have opened new ways of looking at genres as classic and popular as horror movies; filmmakers who still feel indebted in some way or another to the Nouvelle vague alongside others who have broken away from the trend. At the end of the day, ground-breakers, recyclers, mannerists and radicals, all with their own voices, who illustrate the last convulsive decade in French cinema.

Backwash: the cutting edge of French cinema, is the title of a retrospective reflecting the comings and goings of French movies over the last ten years. In surf jargon, 'backwash' is an iconic phenomenon caused by the force and spectacular pounding together of two or more waves as they thunder on their way in different directions, often smashing into each other on rebound from the coast. Drawing this comparison, the retrospective looks at the currents inherited from the undertow of the Nouvelle vague in the 60s, inducing French cinema to revamp in different directions, a creative drift currently gaining strength and encompassing a wide spectrum of genres.

Unlike the situation occurring with crystallization of the Nouvelle vague, in which its most representative exponents (Godard, Truffaut, Rivette, Rohmer and Chabrol) had shared the characteristic, during their former period as critics, of questioning the model established in the French cinema of the 40s and 50s, the names we could include in this backwash don't "clash" with an earlier swell: while some moviemakers make the most of the earlier movements, others radically question them.

But neither is this a unitary movement, a feature characterizing a Nouvelle vague of which the major exponents had all put pen to paper in the Cahiers du Cinéma prior to collaborating with one other during their early days as directors. The backwash embraces many, widely differing and sometimes conflicting expressions, in which more harmonious forms rub shoulders with ideological, aesthetic and narrative provocation.

The retrospective will consist of around 40 films including L’Humanité (Humanity, 1999) by Bruno Dumont; Ressources humaines (Human Resources, 1999) by Laurent Cantet, winner of the New Directors Award in San Sebastian; Dans ma peau (In My Skin, 2002) by Marina de Van; La Vie nouvelle (A New Life, 2002) by Philippe Grandrieux; the controversial Irréversible (Irreversible, 2002) by Gaspar Noé; Innocence (2003) by Lucile Hadzihalilovic, wife of Noé, also winner of an award at the Festival for this film; Les revenants (They Came Back, 2004) by Robin Campillo, Cantet's regular screenwriter; Rois et reine (Kings & Queen, 2004) by Arnaud Desplechin; De battre mon coeur s’est arrêté (The Beat That My Heart Skipped, 2005) by Jacques Audiard; Les chansons d’amour (Love Songs, 2007) by Christophe Honoré, who participated in last year's Official Selection at the Festival with La Belle personne (The Beautiful Person), and two of the basic titles in the last batch of French horror productions, À l’intérieur (Inside, 2007), by Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury, and Martyrs (2008), by Pascal Lagier.

We will also look at the influence of earlier directors on the maturation of this renovation of today's French cinema, such as Olivier Assayas, Leos Carax or Claire Denis.

The 40 films that make up the retrospective “Backwash: the cutting age of French Cinema” are the following:

We will also program two sessions of short films including the following titles:

• Backwash: Short Films 1
  • Millevaches Expérience , by Pierre Vinour (2000) 10'
  • Monsieur William, les traces d'une vie possible, by Denis Gaubert (2001) 25'
  • Delices, by Gérard Cairaschi (2002) 10'
  • Sometimes, by Pleix (2003) 3'
  • Obras, by Hendrick Dussolier (2004) 12'
  • La peur, petit chasseur , by Laurent Achard (2004) 9'
  • Du soleil en hiver, by Samuel Collardey (2005) 17'
  • Quelques miettes pour les oiseaux, by Nassim Amaouche (2005) 28'
  • Dix, by Bif (2009) 7'
    
• Backwash: Short Films 2
  • Jeux de plage, by Laurent Cantet (1995) 28'
  • Une robe d'été, by François Ozon (1996) 15'
  • Bien sous tous rapports, Marina De Van (1996) 11'
  • L'interview, by Xavier Gianolli (1998) 25'
  • Cindy, the Doll Is Mine, by Bertrand Bonello (2005) 15'
  • De Retour, by Jalil Lespert (2005) 23'

Thematic retrospective.

Under more generic, allegorically-entitled headings, the Festival has grouped together films not commonly offered (even in specialised sections) and which, nevertheless, deserve filmgoersí attention. Based on this philosophy, a number of cycles have seen the light, including "The Guys in the Photo", "Forgotten Films"; "You Only Live Once", "The Best 100 Years in our Lives", "The European Adventure", "Spanish Cinema Discoveries", "The Red Nightmare", "A Long Absence", the two editions dedicated to post-war Italian comedy, entitled "Hunger, Humour and Fantasy" and "The Boom Italian-Style", or "The TV Generation", "It Happened yesterday", "50 from the 50s", "Amongst friends and neighbours", "Incorrect@s", "Rebellious and untamed", "Emigrants", "Cold Fever", "Japanese Film Noir" last of these cycles.

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