22/02/2006

Less than a week after its warm reception at the screening in official competition in Berlin (see article), Claude Chabrol’s A Comedy of Power [+see also:
trailer
film profile] hits French theatres, distributed by Pan Européenne Distribution on an impressive 282 screens. With the help of its star Isabelle Huppert and a true political-financial story (the "Elf affair") with which the French public is very familiar, the top French film of the week is up against five American features (among them, Steven Gaghan’s Syriana and Irish filmmaker Jim Sheridan’s Get Rich or Die Tryin'), a Canadian and a Chinese title.

Also being released today, on 10 screens by Ciné Classic, is Itinéraires (lit. "Itineraries") by Christophe Otzenberger. The film was produced by French company Ex Nihilo on a €1.9m budget, with an advance on receipts from the National Film Centre (CNC).

It is worth noting that three films co-produced in Europe arrive in theatres today. The first is Massaker, a Lebanon/Germany/France/Switzerland co-production directed by the trio Monika Borgmann, Lokman Slim and Hermann Theissen, distributed by Zootrope Films on six screens. This documentary, which looks back at the 1982 massacres in Sabra and Chatila, picked up the Fipresci Award at the 2005 Berlin Film Festival. Second is Milos Radovic’s Falling Into Paradise, a Germany/France/Holland/Serbia co-production, with Mact Productions as the film’s French partners, which Equation is distributing on four screens,. Lastly, Le diable à quatre (lit. "The Devil In Quartet") by Alice de Andrade, a co-production between Brazil, Portugal, France (Les Films d'Après-midi) and Switzerland, will be released on 10 screens by Cinéma Public Films.

(Translated from French)