What's new

Are French better film maker ? (1 Viewer)

Nick

Second Unit
Joined
Jun 30, 1997
Messages
251
Are french poeple better film maker ? So many hollywood studios did a remake of their films (Some should have been left alone like "the vanishing" and "La femme Nikita" )

Of all the Foreigh films that I've watched. I enjoined french films the most yes, even with subtitles.
 

Carlo_M

Senior HTF Member
Joined
Oct 31, 1997
Messages
13,385
There are many worthwhile "auteur" and indie American films that just never get wide theatrical release because Hollywood basically controls what goes into the multiplexes.
 

andrew markworthy

Senior HTF Member
Joined
Sep 30, 1999
Messages
4,762
A lot of the French cinematic output is dross, just like any other country's. However, unlike the Americans or Brits, the French generally have the sense not to export their dross to other countries.

Having said this, probably a higher proportion of European cinema is of arthouse quality. This is because movies are far more likely to be sponsored by public-funded bodies and the worthy is likely to be favoured over the commercial. However, I don't think this means that European cinema is 'naturally' better.
 

Bjorn Olav Nyberg

Supporting Actor
Joined
Oct 12, 1999
Messages
945
Andrew is correct, while I don't really know the situation in France that good, having public funding tends to do just that. But there are exceptions in Europe as well, I know in Sweden and Denmark for example that kind of public funding is more rare, so danish and swedish filmmakers actually have to keep in mind what does and doesn't sell tickets as well...

(this was probably a little off topic, sorry)
 

Arman

Screenwriter
Joined
Jan 10, 2003
Messages
1,625
Absolutely! :) Yes. (?)

"French films tend to get better star-ratings from me. Other than that, I dunno."

Same is true with me! (Actually, I use the grading system of F thru A+ :))
 

Andy Sheets

Senior HTF Member
Joined
Aug 6, 2000
Messages
2,377
I remember seeing that movie The Visitors, the one that Just Visiting was a remake of. Man, that was a stupid movie... ;)

A friend of mine in college was French. We were talking about movies once and he said that as far as he was concerned American movies were better in general than French movies. What absolutely drove him crazy, however, was when a worthy French movie would come out only to get shoved off of French movie screens in favor of Hollywood-produced crap like The Three Ninjas Kick Back. I think that would probably drive me crazy too -- oh wait, it happens over here all the time. So I do know what that feels like :)
 

george kaplan

Senior HTF Member
Joined
Mar 14, 2001
Messages
13,063
I certainly don't think so. For every masterpiece like Diabolique, there's a equally good masterpiece like Vertigo.

I guess I'd better put on that old flame suit:

For every American piece of trash like Titanic, there's Godard's latest piece of crap. :)
 

Steve Christou

Long Member
Senior HTF Member
Joined
Apr 25, 2000
Messages
16,333
Location
Manchester, England
Real Name
Steve Christou
Good response George, although I don't agree that Titanic is a piece of trash, its no worse than other crowd pleasers of its ilk, and for sheer spectacle alone it's worth seeing.
I'd rather have Titanic in my collection than the much lauded Amelie, any day.

French and many other European films don't interest me in the slightest. I can't stand Greek films and my parents are Greek.

I don't really want to waste my time watching subtitled Euro-dramas, no matter how well made they might be, there's more than enough English and HK/Japanese films to keep me happy, no offence just my opinion.:)
 

andrew markworthy

Senior HTF Member
Joined
Sep 30, 1999
Messages
4,762
For every American piece of trash like Titanic, there's Godard's latest piece of crap.
I think a more appropriate analogy would be 'for every one of Woddy Allen's later unfunny movies there's a Godard'. Or alternatively, 'for every Titanic, there's an Asterix live action movie'.
 

Kenneth English

Second Unit
Joined
Sep 29, 1999
Messages
418
I don't think it would be possible to say that any country has a monopoly on "good" filmmaking. France has Luc Besson, Mathieu Kassovitz, Gaspar Noe, etc. America has Martin Scorsese, David Lynch, Robert Altman, Spielberg. Etc, etc, etc. Good filmmakers are everywhere.

Conversely, every country has it's share of merde as well. I can't tell you how many truly abysmmal French "comedies" I have had to sit through with my girlfriend (she speaks fluent French & Italian). She loves Un indien dans la ville -- anyone ever seen this thing? Oh, the humanity!

The French crank out at least the same amount of crap as we Yanks do! :)
 

Nick

Second Unit
Joined
Jun 30, 1997
Messages
251
I believe it's in half dutch and half french. Not really sure who made it. I have the DVD. I have to check that out.
 

Francois Caron

Senior HTF Member
Joined
Jul 31, 1997
Messages
2,640
Location
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Real Name
François Caron
It's all a question of perception. The way I see it, if you don't know the language of the movie you're watching, you may tend to see that movie as being *ahem* "culturally superior" to the language(s) you do know. But if you know more than one language, you begin to understand why this perception exists even if a foreign movie many critics find extraordinary may appear to be rather ordinary from your own perspectives.

It's a bit hard to visualize. But when you know the "other" language, you can put aside the "romance" of the language and better judge the movie on its own merits. That's when you realize foreign movie studios can create works of art just as well as monstrous turkeys. For example. The "Trois Couleurs" trilogy and "Le Fabuleux Destin D'Amélie Poulain" are clearly works of cinematic art, no doubt about that. "Astérix et Obélix: Mission Cléopâtre" may not be necessarily a work of art, but it's definitely a lot of fun to watch especially if you've read the series when you were a kid (I'm still reading them!). As for "Un Indien Dans La Ville", it's only slightly better than the American remake, which ain't exactly saying much.

So do the French make better movies than the Americans? Not really. The quality of their movies can vary just as much as the quality of movies coming from other countries including the USA. But if you really want to know if a foreign movie is good or not, you'll just have to watch the movie and judge it for yourself.
 

Users who are viewing this thread

Forum statistics

Threads
356,814
Messages
5,123,629
Members
144,184
Latest member
H-508
Recent bookmarks
0
Top