The French Minister

My Journey Through French Cinema (2017), Bertrand Tavernier’s César-nominated three-and-a-half-hour tour through French film history, was too short to introduce audiences to all that he wanted to share. In this new eight-part series (8x55min), the acclaimed director of such films as Coup de Torchon and ‘Round Midnight guides us through a roster of filmmakers both influential and forgotten, explores how his country’s cinema was shaped by the German occupation and changed again through the New Wave, spotlights little-known female filmmakers, and more. Subjects include: René Clément, Henri-Georges Clouzot, Julien Duvivier, Henri Decoin, Claude Autant-Lara, as well as composers who made movie music an art in and of itself, far from the Hollywood spotlight.

Novelist and filmmaker Jose Giovanni turned to the remarkable true story of how his father helped him escape a date with the guillotine for this drama, which is based closely on events from his own life. During World War II, Manu (Vincent Lecoeur, as a character Giovanni modeled after himself) fought with the French Resistance, but near the end of the war he fell into a life of crime, and in 1947, 22-year-old Manu was arrested for his part in a bungled robbery that left a man dead. While Manu did not pull the fatal trigger, he refuses to say who did, since it would mean implicating his uncle, one of the few members of his family who has stood by him; Manu's brother is dead, and he turned his back on his father Joe (Bruno Cremer) years ago. Manu is sentenced to death, and while he protests his innocence, his attempts to escape from prison do little to convince anyone that he's telling the truth.

Enigmatic gangster Silien may or may not be responsible for informing on Faugel, who was just released from prison and is already involved in what should be a simple heist. By the end of this brutal, twisting, and multilayered policier, who will be left to trust?

A half English, half French screenwriter visits her parents on the Riviera after her father's heart surgery. Once there, she begins to connect with him in a way she never did before, as each member of the family tries to cope with his imminent death.

Barny, although a Marxist, is intrigued by the mysteries of religion. In confession, she teases a priest, Léon Morin, but he is a young and intelligent man and ready to discuss anything.

Inside the Blue Note nightclub one night in 1959 Paris, an aged, ailing jazzman coaxes an eloquent wail from his tenor sax. Outside, a young Parisian too broke to buy a glass of wine strains to hear those notes. Soon they will form a friendship that sparks a final burst of genius.

In a mining town which has been blighted by economic downturns, an elementary school headmaster struggles to obtain social services on behalf of his students.

In Paris, Lulu, a passionate policeman, works with the faith of a rookie, despite the sclerotic bureaucracy and the incompetence or negligence of some of his colleagues. In his new position as a narcotics inspector, he tries to keep his sanity as he witnesses the worst of the human condition.

Art film producer Jeremy Prokosch, unhappy with the work of his director, hires Fritz Lang (as himself) to direct an adaptation of The Odyssey, but when it seems that the legendary filmmaker is making a picture destined to bomb, he brings in a screenwriter to energise the script. The professional intersects with the personal when a rift develops between the writer and his wife.

A pathetic police chief, humiliated by everyone around him, suddenly wants a clean slate in life, and resorts to drastic means to achieve it.

In France, before WWI. As every Sunday, an old painter living in the country is visited by his son Gonzague, coming with his wife and his three children. Then his daugther Irene arrives. She is always in a hurry, she lives alone and does not come so often... An intimist chronicle in which what is not shown, what is guessed, is more important than how it looks, dealing with what each character expects of life.

After several days without seeing Sylvie, the object of his desire again, a nameless law student becomes involved with Jacqueline, who works at the local bakery. Eventually, he has to choose when he arranges dates with both on the same day.

Michel Descombes is a watchmaker who lives in Lyon with his teenage son Bernard. When the police visit and inform him that Bernard has killed a man and is on the run with a girl, Michel realises that he knew far less about his son than he thought.

France, 1893. Joseph Bouvier attempts to shoot his love who refused to marry him and to commit suicide. Upon release from the filthy asylum where he was placed, with bullets still remaining in his head, he wanders the country roads and rapes and murders many teenagers over years. The judge Rousseau captures him, but to serve his ambition seeks to avoid that Bouvier is simply declared insane.

The last days of World War I, Eastern front. Captain Conan, a lone wolf, a true warrior, leads a band of ruthless French fighters who love hand-to-hand combat; they are not fit for peacetime, they only feel really alive in the chaos of the battlefield.

During the Nazi occupation of France, two filmmakers try to build a career without compromising their ideals.