Allons-y! FrancOfilm, the annual festival of French films is back in the UAE.
From March 18 to 21, Vox Cinemas in Abu Dhabi and Dubai will screen seven acclaimed French films from around the world, including Marion Cotillard’s Two Days One Night, for which she was nominated for a best actress Oscar.
The festival, to mark International Francophonie Day — a celebration of the French language on March 20 — is an initiative by Institut Francais in the UAE and the French Embassy to the UAE, supported by the Dubai International Film Festival and the Abu Dhabi Film Festival.
Two Days, One Night, the award-winning drama from Belgium, tells the story of a woman who sets out to fight the system to keep her job.
Moroccan film Fievres (Fevers), which recently won the top prize at the Fespaco film festival, Africa’s biggest film event, will also screen. The drama, about a tumultuous relationship between a father and his lonely, violent son in a rough French neighbourhood, is directed by Hicham Ayouch.
Also in the schedule is celebrated Haitian director Raoul Peck’s documentary film Assistance Mortel, a two-year journey inside the colossal rebuilding efforts in post-earthquake Haiti.
French actor Omar Sy, best known for the massive international hit The Intouchables, stars in Samba by Eric Toledano and Olivier Nakache, about a wrongly-incarcerated immigrant who fights for his right to stay in France despite mounting bureaucratic pressure.
Other films to be screened during the three days include March of the Penguins director Luc Jacquet’s latest film Il Etait Une Foret (Once Upon a Forest); Yasmina et les 60 noms de l’amour (Yasmina and the 60 names of love) from Tunisia; and Canada’s La Petite Rein (The Little Queen), about a young champion cyclist caught up in a doping drama.
Tickets prices are standard film tickets. For timings and age restrictions, go to voxcinemas.com
