Depardon's beautiful film is a moving portrait of the changing face of life in rural France.  In the Haut-Garonne, the octogenarian Privat brothers struggle with age and declining health; an elderly couple see their dairy herd dwindle to just one cow; a middle-aged man resents his responsibility for the family farm; and an enthusiastic young woman finds herself faced with insurmountable obstacles as she attempts to acquire her own place.  Depardon approaches all of them--people not necessarily at ease with talking about themselves or their situations--with great empathy and affection, and the quiet beauty of the landscape has a voice of its own.  Ordinary life perhaps, but described with deep feeling in a universal language.

Selected Filmography: Reporters (81), News Items (83), Empty Quarter (85), Captive of the Desert (90), Lumière and Company (95), The 10th Judicial Court (04).

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The year is 1912. Wilhelm, a German art critic and collector, moves to a small village north of Paris and rents an apartment from Madame Duphot.  Séraphine, Madame Duphot's maid, paints in her spare time, using everything she can find that is free: wine, mud, fruit and flowers.  The locals don't take Séraphine or her paintings seriously, but when Wilhelm, an enthusiastic advocate of modern and "primitive" artists, comes across one of her paintings, he's mesmerized.  It is the beginning of a nurturing relationship that allows her to invisible career to blossom.  Based on the little-known story of one of France's most fascinating painters, Séraphine celebrates the power of art and nature, and the resilience of the artistic spirit.

Filmography: Cocon (92), Tortilla and Cinema (97), Song From Within (03).

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Woody Allen meets Eric Rohmer in writer-director-actor Emmanuel Mouret's delicately droll romantic comedy.  After a chance encounter on the streets of Nantes, Gabriel and Emilie sense romance in the air, though alas, they are both involved with other people. When Gabriel proposes "a kiss with no consequences," Emilie--knowing there is no such thing--pauses to tell a story.  Through flashbacks, we learn the story of her friends Nicolas and Judith and the brief, seemingly innocent kiss they once shared--which led to the transformation of their entire lives.  Far from a simple kiss-and-tell tale, Mouret's ingenious interweaving of characters and courtship explores the bittersweet complications of love and the comic certainty of unintended consequences.

Filmography: Venus and Fleur (04), Change of Address (06).

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Since the 1960s Agnès Varda has been making her idiosyncratic and beautiful films, and is honored as "the grandmother of the French New Wave."  In The Beaches of Agnès, which she declares is her last film, Varda turns her camera on herself, returning to the beaches which have played such a significant part in her life and her films.  "If you opened people up, you would find landscapes; if you opened me up, you would find beaches. Many old people wish to tell their life.  As an old filmmaker, with the enthusiasm and energy of my youth, I tried to find a style and a form to tell my memories, my encounters, the ups and downs of my life.  I shot my film as a kaleidoscope, a collage, a fantasy." --Agnès Varda.

Selected Filmography: Cléo From 5 to 7 (62), Le Bonheur (65), Jacquot de Nantes (91), The Gleaners and I (00), Cinévardaphoto (04).

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