Ciné lumière's and the BFI have organised a two-part season celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the Nouvelle Vague. The event is design to give the opportunity to see the movement's key films alongside those that inspired, or were inspired by, them. What's on at the Ciné Lumière?

 

Emerging at the end of the Fifties, the Nouvelle Vague drew openly on American B-movies and film noir for ideas, styles, themes and cultural references, and found inspiration likewise in the films of home-grown talents like Jean Vigo. Ciné lumière's two-part season celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the Nouvelle Vague offers the chance to see the movement's key films alongside those that inspired, or were inspired by, them. The first half (13–22 March) considers the influence of Hitchcock and film noir on the twisty French thrillers of Chabrol and Truffaut; the second (14–21 April) presents the films of the movement's precursor Jean Vigo alongside key films of 'New Hollywood' and of the British and Czech 'new waves'. Audiences can also hear directly from one of the Nouvelle Vague's key's figures: actress Bernadette Lafont, present on 14 March to introduce of her films Les Mistons, Le Beau Serge and Les Bonnes Femmes.

A two-day conference opens the season on 13 & 14 March.

Season opens with a symposium (13 & 14 March), organised by the University of London (Screen Studies Group) and the University of Southampton (AHRC-funded French Cinema in Britain Research Project).

The Nouvelle Vague season is presented in collaboration with the BFI Southbank.

 

Friday 13-Saturday 14 March 2009 

A celebration of the 50th anniversary of the French New Wave and its arrival on British shores
Guest of Honour : Bernadette Lafont, star of Les Mistons and Le Beau Serge

From 9.30am to 5.30pm

This two-day event consists of an international symposium with panel discussions and keynote speakers, as well as screenings introduced by a range of personalities, including star Bernadette Lafont and filmmaker Stephen Frears. Speakers drawn from France, the UK and the USA will discuss the legacy of the film movement that revolutionarized the cinema at the turn of the 1960s, with particular emphasis on: filmmakers such as Jean-Luc Godard, Agnès Varda and Chris Marker; the relationship between the New Wave and politics; the New Wave and modernity; the critical reception of the New Wave; different cinematic practices on the ‘Right bank’ and the ‘Left bank’; and the international reach and influence of the New Wave – from Britain to Brazil.

Speakers include: Stephen Frears, Philip French, Geneviève Sellier, Antoine de Baecque, Vanessa Schwartz, Jean-Loup Bourget, Roland-François Lack, Jean Pierre-Esquenazi, Colin MacCabe, Chris Darke, Sarah Cooper, Valerie Orpen, Christophe Dupin, Emma Wilson, Yosefa Loshitzsky, Isolde Standish and Lúcia Nagib. Screenings (tbc) include: Les Mistons, Le Beau Serge, Les 400 Coups.

The event is organised by Geoffrey Nowell-Smith and Ginette Vincendeau of the Screen Studies Group (University of London) together with Lucy Mazdon and Catherine Wheatley of the AHRC-funded French Cinema in Britain Research Project (University of Southampton), in conjunction with the Cinélumière, Institut Français, London.

Symposium Booking

Ciné lumière
Box Office: T. 020 7073 1350
Friday 13 March: £20 (£10 concessions)*
Saturday 14 March:  £20 (£10 concessions)*
Full weekend: £40 (£20 concessions)*

*Please note that these prices exclude film screenings

Film Programme

Standard ticket price (£9, conc. £7) applies EXCEPT where indicated below.

Les Quatre cents coups (The 400 Blows)

France | 1959 | 99 mins | dir. François Truffaut, with Jean-Pierre Léaud | cert. PG

François Truffaut’s first feature is also his most personal. Told through the eyes of his life-long cinematic counterpart, Antoine Doinel (Jean-Pierre Léaud), Les Quatre cents coups sensitively re-creates the trials of Truffaut’s own difficult childhood, unsentimentally portraying aloof parents, oppressive teachers, petty crime, and a friendship that would last a lifetime. More than a semi-autobiographical film, Les Quatre cents coups is also an elaboration of what the Nouvelle Vague directors would embrace as the caméra-stylo (camera-as-pen) whose écriture (writing style) could express the filmmaker as personally as a novelist’s pen. One of the supreme examples of 'cinema in the first person singular', the film marks Truffaut’s passage from leading critic of the Nouvelle Vague to his emergence as one of Europe’s most brilliant auteurs.


Fri 13 Mar, 8.40pm

Tue 14 April, 8.40pm

Wed 15 April, 3.00pm

Thur 16 April: 3.00pm, 6.15pm

Fri 17 April, 3.00pm, 6.15pm

Sat 18 April, 8.40pm

Sun 19 April: 8.40pm

Tue 21 April: 8.40pm 

Les Mistons (The Brats) and Le Beau Serge

- Les Mistons

France | 1957 | 23 mins | dir. François Truffaut, with Gérard Blain, Bernadette Lafont

A lyrical and nostalgic work tinged with sadness and resentment, this 23-minute short is Truffaut's debut and one of the first films to set the tone for the Nouvelle Vague. Filmed outside in the streets and parks of Nime using natural light and a small film crew, the movie chronicles an eventful summer in the lives of five adolescent boys who become fascinated with Bernadette, a sensuous young woman who awakens their first feelings of sexual desire.

- Le beau Serge

France | 1959 | 98 mins | dir. Claude Chabrol, with Gérard Blain, Jean-Claude Brialy, Bernadette Lafont | cert. 15

Chabrol's debut feature is a powerful examination of male friendship and its consequences with Jean-Claude Brialy as a student who returns from Paris to his childhood home to find that his gifted friend (Blain) has destroyed his life through drink. A bleak and beautifully-observed picture of provincial life, Le Beau Serge is generally regarded as the film that launched the New Wave.

Sat 14 Mar,  6.15pm,  introduced by Bernadette Laffont

Sat 21 Mar, 4.00pm (Le Beau Serge only)

Les Bonnes Femmes (The good Girls)

France | 1960 | 95 mins | dir. Claude Chabrol, with Bernadette Lafont, Stéphane Audran, Clotilde Joana, Claude Berri | cert. 15

Meeting no great critical acclaim on its first release, this is now rated one of Claude Chabrol's early masterpieces and a major film of the Nouvelle Vague. The 'bonnes femmes' of the title are four young Parisian women, who make up for the ennui of their working life in an electrical goods shop by regularly hitting the town in search of glamour and romance. Chabrol's mixture of documentary-style realism, slice-of-life drama and black humour combines with stunning black-and-white photography and fine performances to impressive effect.

Sat 14 Mar, 8.45pm
Followed by a Q&A with Bernadette Lafont in conversation with Professor Ginette Vincendeau, Kings College, University of London

Sun 22 Mar,  8.40pm, TB3 with A Judgement in Stone and Blood Relatives 

Vivre sa Vie (It's my Life)

France | 1962 |  83 mins | dir. Jean-Luc Godard, with Anna Karina, Saddy Rebbot | cert. 15

'One of the most extraordinary, beautiful, and original works of art that I know of ... [It] seems to me a perfect film.' (Susan Sontag)

Faced with a failed relationship and a dead-end job, Nana leaves her family behind to pursue an acting career, but instead slips into a life of prostitution on the streets of Paris. Told in twelve Brechtian tableaux and filmed in an austere, documentary-like style, Vivre sa vie is one of Godard's most beautifully designed and deeply felt films, anchored by Karina's astonishing lead performance and Raoul Coutard's breathtaking cinematography of street-level Paris.

Sun 15 Mar | 2.00pm

Nouvelle Vague Shorts

A selection of French and British New Wave films including La Jetée from Chris Marker, L'Opéra Mouffe from Agnès Varda, The Vanishing Street from Robert Vas and Moma Don't Allow from Karel Reisz and Tony Richardson

Fri 13 Mar | 6.30pm | £7, conc. £5

- L'Opéra Mouffe

France | 1958 | b&w | dir. Agnès Varda

A pregnant filmmaker takes us to rue Mouffetard, 'la Mouffe,' in the Latin Quarter of Paris for a mix of documentary footage and imagined scenes. Vignettes or chapters unfold - on the feeling of nature, on pregnancy, on anxiety, on desire, and so forth. Women shop at a vegetable market, their faces marked by care and poverty. We see young lovers, playful and innocent. Derelicts drink and sleep on sidewalks. A weary pregnant woman carries her shopping bags; later, she eats flowers. There are counterpoints of gritty realism and playful, near-surrealistic images. Political and artistic consciousnesses create a montage.

- La Jetée

France | 1962 | b&w | dir. Chris Marker, with Jean Négroni, Hélène Chatelain, Davos Hanich

In a devastated Paris in the aftermath of WWIII, The few surviving humans begin researching time travel, hoping to send someone back to the pre-war world for food, supplies and maybe a solution to their dire position. One man is haunted by a vague childhood memory that will prove fateful.

- The Vanishing Street

UK | 1962 | dir. Robert Vas | 20 mins | doc

A year after directing Refuge England (1961), which described the first day of an East-European refugee in London, Robert Vas chose another familiar subject for his new project. Vas shot the film in 1961 in and around Hessel Street in London's East End, moments before bulldozers started pulling down the old shops and houses. The Vanishing Street documents, in twenty minutes, the life of a typical Jewish community in 1960s Britain, showing us its street market, kosher food shops, newspaper and synagogue, all preserving the community's identity.

- Moma Don't Allow

UK | 1955 | dir. Karel Reisz, | 22 mins | doc

A night at the Wood Green Jazz Club - an example of 'Free Cinema.

Truffaut, An Autobiography

France | 2004 | 78 mins | doc | dir. Anne Andreu

Woody Allen, Fanny Ardant, Claude Berri, Catherine Deneuve, Arnaud Desplechin, Milos Forman and Jeanne Moreau are among the impressive line-up of friends and colleagues interviewed for this insightful documentary on the key Nouvelle Vague director. Includes extracts from Truffaut's films and footage of the director on set and off.

Sun 15 Mar | 4.00pm | DB1 with Confidentially Yours

 

Vivement Dimanche ! (Confidentially Yours)

France | 1983 |  111 mins | dir. François Truffaut, with Fanny Ardant, Jean-Louis Trintignant, Jean-Pierre Kalfon | cert. PG

Truffaut's final feature is his take on the classic Hitchcockian thriller. A businessman is wanted by the police for the double murder of his wife and her lover. Refusing to believe in his guilt, his secretary sets out to investigate the case herself. Beautifully shot in black and white, Truffaut's final feature mixes elements of Hollywood comedy and the atmosphere of classic film noir.

Sun 15 Apr | 6.00pm | DB2 with Truffaut, An Autobiography

Mon 16 Apr | 8.40pm

Rebecca

USA | 1940 | 130 mins | dir. Alfred Hitchcock, with Joan Fontaine, Laurence Olivier | cert. PG

In Hitchcock’s romantic, suspenseful, elegant film, adapted from Daphne du Maurier's popular novel, a young woman (Joan Fontaine) believes her every dream has come true when her whirlwind romance with the dashing Maxim de Winter culminates in marriage. But she soon realizes that Rebecca, the late first Mrs de Winter, haunts both the temperamental, brooding Maxim and the de Winter mansion, Manderley. In order for Maxim and the new Mrs de Winter to have a future, Rebecca’s spell must be broken and the mystery of her violent death unraveled.

Sun 15 Mar | 8.30pm

The Woman in the Window

USA | 1944 |  99 mins | dir. Fritz Lang, with Edward G Robinson, Joan Bennett

Richard Wanley, a middle-aged college professor, is left to fend for himself when his wife and children go on holiday. Fascinated by a portrait of a woman in a shop window, he is shocked to find the model who posed for the portrait is standing next to him. Wanley accepts an apparently innocent invitation to the woman’s apartment, but unexpectedly winds up killing her abusive boyfriend. Horrified by his actions, Wanley then makes the mistake of disposing of the body, and is drawn into an increasingly nightmarish world of lies, deceit, and, possibly, another murder.

Thu 19 Mar | 6.00pm

L'Ivresse du Pouvoir (A Comedy of power)

France | 2006 | 110 mins | dir. Claude Chabrol, with Isabelle Huppert, François Berléand | cert. 12

Chabrol's seventh collaboration with Isabelle Huppert is a sly satire on bourgeois morality and transient celebrity. Judge Jeanne Charmant Killman is assigned the job of investigating a high-profile case of corruption and embezzlement at a giant state-supported company. The deeper she delves and the more she uncovers, the more powerful she becomes. However, under the pressures of her sudden influence and notoriety, Killmans private life begins to unravel, and she finds herself probing both the limits of her own power and its intoxicating grip.

Sat 21 Mar | 8.30pm

Ascenseur pour l'échafaud (Lift to the Scaffold)

France | 1958 | 88 mins | dir. Louis Malle, with Jeanne Moreau, Maurice Ronet

Florence and her ex-paratrooper lover Julien scheme to murder her husband by faking a suicide, but a forgotten rope and malfunctioning lift conspire to complicate their plans. In his mesmerizing debut feature (winner of the prestigious Prix Louis Delluc), 24-year-old director Louis Malle brought together the beauty of Jeanne Moreau, the camerawork of Henri Decaë, and a now legendary score by Miles Davis.

'New Wave' before such a concept truly existed and a touchstone of the careers of both its star and director, Ascenseur pour l'échafaud is a richly atmospheric thriller of murder and mistaken identity unfolding over one restless Parisian night.

Sun 22 Mar | 2.00pm

Thu 26 Mar | 3.00pm 

La Cérémonie (A Judgment in the Stone)

France | 1995 | 112 mins | dir. Claude Chabol, with Isabelle Huppert, Sandrine Bonnaire, Jacqueline Bisset | cert. 15

An illiterate maid hired by a well-meaning bourgeois family forms a dangerous relationship with a bitter postal clerk. The older woman instills her protégée with a secret hatred of the bourgeoisie, and together they slowly and unpleasantly begin to vent their frustration. Beautifully shaped and paced, this film is a suspenseful thriller and a bleak observation on class power play.

Sun 22 Mar | 4.00pm | TB1 with The Good Girls and Blood Relatives 

Les Liens du Sang (Blood Relatives)

Canada/France | 1978 | col | 100 mins | dir. Claude Chabrol, with Donald Sutherland, Donald Pleasence | cert. 18

Transposing an Ed McBain 87th Precinct novel to Montreal, Chabrol co-wrote and directed this disturbing psychological thriller starring Donald Sutherland as an enigmatic and haunted-looking cop investigating the assault and murder of a 17-year-old girl. A local paedophile (Donald Pleasence) tops the suspect list before suspicion falls on members of the girl's own family...

Sun 22 Mar | 6.20pm | TB2 with The Good Girls and A Judgement in Stone

Jean Vigo, early works

• A propos de Nice  (France | 1930 | 25 mins)
• Zéro de Conduite  (France | 1933 | 41 mins)

'I was immediately overwhelmed with wild enthusiasm,' wrote Truffaut of his first encounter with the films of Jean Vigo. Here we present a double bill of Vigo's shorter works, Zéro de conduite a delightful chronicle of a revolt by students against school authorities, and A propos de Nice , a satirical essay about the city at carnival time.

Tue 14 Apr | 6.15pm

Daisies

Czechoslovakia | 1966 | 74 mins | dir. Vera Chytilova, with Ivana Karbanova, Jitka Cerhova

Ester Krumbachova and Vera Chytilova, the two most significant female artists of the Czech New Wave collaborated on this anarchic assault on materialism. Employing collage, superimposition, symbolic mise en scène and prismatic distortion, they concoct a surrealist fantasy of the banality and conformity of Czech society as two girls, both named Marie, dupe several boorish males before indulging in an orgy of gleeful destruction.

Wed 15 Apr | 6.30pm | DB1 with the Fireman's Ball

Sat 18 Apr | 3.00pm

The Fireman's Ball

Czechoslovakia/Italy | 1967 | 71 mins | dir. Milos Forman, with Josef Kolb, Jan Vostrcil

A ball held to celebrate a veteran fire chief's retirement goes embarrassingly wrong: the beauty pageant turns ugly, the lottery prizes vanish, the guest of honour develops a bladder problem and as the drunken revelry becomes increasingly ribald, a fire breaks out in town. Milos Forman's last film in Czechoslovakia before his American exile begins as a gently mocking comedy of small-town manners, but ends as a blazing allegorical satire on the incompetence, insularity and ideological idiocy of the country's rulers.

Wed 15 Apr | 8.30pm | DB2 with Daisies

Fri 17 Apr | 8.40pm

 

Festen (The Celebration) 

Denmark/Sweden | 1998 | 105 mins | dir. Thomas Vinterberg, with Ulrich Thomsen, Henning Moritzen | cert. 15

When three generations of a family meet at a handsome country hotel to celebrate the 60th birthday of the patriarch Helge lighthearted revelry swiftly descends into accusation and recrimination. A blistering study of bourgeois secrets and lies, Festen is the film that kick-started Dogme 95 – the Danish movement which, decrying the failure of the Nouvelle Vague and the descent of European art cinema into bourgeois self-absorption, promised a new dawn for a radical, self-aware and engaged cinema of the here and now.

Thu 16 Apr | 8.30pm

Le Mépris (Contempt)

France/Italy | 1963 |  103 mins | dir. Jean-Luc Godard, with Brigitte Bardot, Michel Piccoli, Jack Palance, Fritz Lang | cert. 15

Unusually cast and playfully shot, Le Mépris is a brilliant study of marital breakdown, artistic compromise and the cinematic process. Michel Piccoli stars as a screenwriter torn between the demands of a proud European director (played by legendary director Fritz Lang), a crude and arrogant American producer (Jack Palance), and his disillusioned wife, Camille (Brigitte Bardot), as he attempts to doctor the script for a new film version of The Odyssey.

Sat 18 Apr | 6.20pm
Sun 19 apr | 6.00pm

L'Atalante 

France | 1934 | 89 mins | dir. Jean Vigo, with Jean Dasté, Dita Parlo, Michel Simon | cert. PG

'When Jean Vigo shot L'Atalante…he achieved perfection, he made a masterpiece.' - François Truffaut

This sensuous hymn to liberation follows the ups and downs of a young married couple, a young barge captain (Jean Dasté) and a country girl (Dita Parlo). When their domestic quarters prove too confining, it takes first mate 'Pere Jules' (the wonderful Michel Simon) to bring them back together. Suffused with fevered, dream-like eroticism, L'Atalante was a major inspiration to Nouvelle Vague directors, and is among the ten greatest films ever made.

Sun 19 Apr | 1.30pm

Thu 23 Apr | 3.00pm 

Bonnie and Clyde

USA | 1967 | 112 mins | dir. Arthur Penn, with Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway, Gene Hackman | cert. 18

One of the pivotal films of the 1960s, Bonnie and Clyde is also a wonderful portrait of amour fou, with Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway as the eponymous heroes whose pursuit of love and larceny scars a dark arrow across the heart of America. Penn's brilliant evocation of the Depression era and America's most notorious bandits changed American cinema, reinvigorating the gangster genre with European, Nouvelle Vague techniques and a radically candid view of sex and violence.

Sun 19 Apr | 3.30pm
Mon 20 Apr | 8.40pm 

Raging Bull

USA | 1980 | 129 mins | dir. Martin Scorsese, with Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci | cert. 18

One of the 'movie brat' generation of directors who grew up devouring film with their Wheaties, Scorsese has succeeded like no other in channelling the lessons of his inspirations – including the Nouvelle Vague – into an extraordinarily personal and singular vision. The artistic high-water mark of his career and his remarkable partnership with De Niro, Raging Bull traces the rise and decline of middleweight boxer Jake LaMotta both in and out of the ring.

Mon 20 Apr | 5.30pm

Tue 21 Apr | 3.00pm

A Taste of Honey

UK | 1961 | 100 mins | dir. Tony Richardson, with Rita Tushingham, Dora Bryan | cert. 15

While the Nouvelle Vague attacked French Cinema with a freewheeling inventiveness, England was represented by the ‘kitchen sink realism’ of the ‘New British Cinema’, of which this is a key film. Rita Tushingham stars as the unwanted teenage daughter of Dora Bryan, a hilariously vulgar Salford lass who is being courted by flash and pimpish Robert Stephens. Jo is saved from her living hell by two social exiles – a black sailor, who makes her pregnant, and a homosexual who makes her happy – until the poverty trap snaps shut around her.

Tue 21 Apr | 6.15pm

 

Speakers' Biographies

*Antoine de Baecque* is a film historian and film critic. He has published books on cinephilia, on the history of /Cahiers du cinéma/, on the New Wave (/La nouvelle vague, portrait d’une jeunesse/, 1998), as well as a biography of François Truffaut (/Truffaut, A Biography/, 2008). His most recent book is /L’Histoire-caméra/ (Gallimard 2008). He is currently completing a biography of Jean-Luc Godard, to be published by Grasset in January 2010. He is director of the cinema books series at Ramsay.

*Charles Barr* is Emeritus Professor of Film and Television Studies at the University of East Anglia. His publications on British cinema include /Ealing Studios/ (first published 1977; 3rd edition Cameron & Hollis, and University of California Press, 1999), /English Hitchcock/ (1999) and /Vertigo/ (2002). With Stephen Frears, he co-scripted the
centenary history of British Cinema, /Typically British/ (Channel 4/BFI, 1995).

*Jean-Loup Bourget* is Professor of Film Studies at the Ecole normale supérieure in Paris and the head of ARIAS, a CNRS-based research centre devoted to drama, film and inter-art studies. In earlier years he was French Cultural Attaché in London and Professor of American Literature at the University of Paris 3 – Sorbonne Nouvelle. A regular contributor to the film monthly /Positif/, he has written a dozen books, mostly on “classic” Hollywood and its relationship to European cinema. His latest effort, an essay on Fritz Lang, is in the press.

*Sarah Cooper* is Senior Lecturer in Film Studies at King's College Documentary/ (Oxford: Legenda, 2006) and /Chris Marker/ (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2008). Currently she is working with Ginette Vincendeau on a dictionary of film directors in France. *Chris Darke* is a writer and film critic living in London. He has written for /Sight and Sound, Film Comment, Cahiers du cinema, Trafic/ and /The Independent/. He is also the author of /Light Readings: Film Criticism and Screen Arts/, a monograph on Godard’s /Alphaville/ and is co-author, with Kieron Corless, of /Cannes: Inside the World's Premier Film Festival/.

*Christophe Dupin* is a Research Associate on the AHRB-funded ‘History of the British Film Institute’ Research Project at Queen Mary, University of London, working with Professor Geoffrey Nowell-Smith. He has published in /Sight and Sound/, /Screen/ and the /Journal of Media Practice/ and has contributed chapters to several books. He is currently co-editing a forthcoming book on the BFI's history. He has also programmed a number of events around the Free Cinema movement and produced the definitive /Free Cinema/ DVD box-set for the BFI.

*Stephen Frears* is a celebrated filmmaker who began in the film industry as assistant to Karel Reisz and after extensive experience directing popular regional TV series, had an immediate cinema hit of his own in 1972 with /Gumshoe/ starring Albert Finney. Frears’ diverse works include /Dangerous Liaisons/ which earned six Academy Award nominations, /The Hi-Lo Country/, /Hero/, /The Snapper/ and /Mary Reilly/. He is also the author, with Charles Barr, of /Typically British/ (London: BFI, 1995). His latest work, an adaptation of Colette’s /Chéri /starring Michelle Pfeiffer, has just premiered at the Berlin Film Festival.

*Roland-François Lack* is Senior Lecturer in the department of French at University College London. He has written on Paris and London in the cinema and specialises in the work of Jean-Luc Godard, including recently: ‘/Vivre sa vie/: an Introduction and A to Z’, in /Senses of Cinema/ 48 (2008). He has produced DVD commentaries for /Bande à part/ (Godard) and /Orphée/ (Cocteau).

*Yosefa Loshitzky* is Professor of Film at the University of East She is the author of /The Radical Faces of Godard and Bertolucci//, //Identity Politics on the Israeli Screen/ and /Screening Strangers: Migration and Diaspora in Contemporary European Cinema/* *(forthcoming), the editor of /Spielberg’s Holocaust: Critical Perspectives on //Schindler’s List/ and a guest editor of a special issue of /Third Text/ on “Fortress Europe: Migration, Culture, Representation”. She has also written extensively on film, media, and culture for a variety of journals and book anthologies and served on the editorial board of /Cinema Journal/.

*Lucy Mazdon* is a Reader in Film Studies at the University of Southampton. She is currently directing the AHRC funded research project, ‘French Cinema in Britain since 1930’. She has published widely on French film and television. Her books include /Encore Hollywood: Remaking French Cinema /(BFI: 2000) and the edited collections /France on Film /(Wallflower: 2001) and, with Mike Hammond, /The Contemporary Television Series/ (Edinburgh University Press: 2005). She is currently co-editing with Catherine Wheatley /Je t’aime…moi non plus: Franco-British Cinematic Relations/, a collection of essays which will be published by Berghahn.

*Lúcia Nagib* is Centenary Professor of World Cinemas and Director of the Centre for World Cinemas, University of Leeds. Her major research subjects are cinematic realism, new waves and contemporary new cinemas. She is the author of the books /Werner Herzog: Film as Reality/ (Estação Liberdade), /Around the Japanese Nouvelle Vague /(Editora da Unicamp), /Born of the Ashes: The Auteur and the Individual in Oshima’s Films/ (Edusp), /The Brazilian Film Revival: Interviews with 90 filmmakers of the 90s/ (Editora 34) and /Brazil on Screen: Cinema Novo, New Cinema, Utopia/ (IB Tauris). She is currently working on her book /Cinema and the Ethics of Realism./

*Geoffrey Nowell-Smith* is Senior Research Fellow in the Department of History at Queen Mary University of London and author most recently of /Making Waves: New Cinemas of the 1960s/ (New York and London: Continuuum, 2008).

*Valerie Orpen* is a freelance writer and translator. She has published several articles on French cinema and is the author of /Film Editing: The Art of the Expressive/. She is currently writing an article on the recent 'new wave' of French horror films.

*Jonathan Romney* is a film critic, screenwriter and director. He wrote the short film /One Eyed Jacques/, directed by Richard Clark (2001). At present, his first full length feature /Mood Music /is under option to Tall Storiesand he is also writing the adaptation of /The Man who was Thursday/ by GK Chesterton in collaboration with Raoul Ruiz. Jonathan is the film critic of /The Independent on Sunday/, and also writes for /Sight & Sound, Modern Painters, Film Comment/ and others. His books on film are: /Atom Egoyan/ (bfi), /Short Orders: Film Writing/ (Serpents Tail) and /Celluloid Jukebox/ (ed. with Adrian Wootton, bfi).

*Geneviève Sellier* is Professor of Film Studies at the University of CaenAmong her books are /Jean Grémillon, Le cinéma est à vous/ (1989), /Les Enfants du paradis de Carné et Prévert, étude critique/ (1992), and with Noël Burch, /La Drôle de guerre des sexes du cinéma français
1930-1956/ (1996). Her study of the New Wave, /La Nouvelle Vague, un cinéma au masculin singulier/ (2005) was published in English in 2008 under the title /Masculine Singular: French New Wave Cinema/.

*Isolde Standish* is Senior Lecturer in Film and Media Studies and Associate Dean Research (Faculty of Arts and Humanities) at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. She is author of /Myth and Masculinity in the Japanese Cinema: Towards a Political Reading of the Tragic Hero /(Routledge/Curzon, 2000) and /A New History of Japanese Cinema: A Century of Narrative Film /(Continuum 2005). Her forthcoming book, /Politics Porn and Protest: Japanese Avant-garde Cinema and the 1960s/,/ /will be published by Continuum later in 2009. She has also published various articles on Japanese and Korean Cinema.

*Vanessa R. Schwartz* is Professor of History, Art History and Critical Studies at the University of Southern California where she directs the Graduate Certificate in Visual Studies. She has published on the emergence of film in late nineteenth Paris and has recently published /It's So French! Hollywood, Paris and the Making of Cosmopolitan Film Culture/ (University of Chicago Press) which attempts to re-orient discussions of French film away from the New Wave as the singular achievement of the French cinema of the post-war years. *Ginette Vincendeau *is Professor of Film Studies at King’s College London. Her books include /Pépé le Moko/ (1998); /Stars and Stardom in French Cinema/ (2000 and 2004; in French 2009); /Jean-Pierre Melville: An American in Paris/ (2003); /La Haine/ (2005). She edited /French Film: Texts and Contexts/ with Susan Hayward (1990 and 2000), /Journeys of Desire, European Actors in Hollywood/ with Alastair Phillips (2006). She is a regular contributor to /Sight and Sound/. /The French New Wave, Critical Landmarks /edited with Peter Graham (2009) is published by the BFI to coincide with this conference.

*Catherine Wheatley* is a Research Associate on the AHRC-funded project, ‘French Cinema in Britain since 1930’ at Southampton University, working with Dr Lucy Mazdon. She is the author of /Michael Haneke’s Cinema: The Ethic of the Image/, recently published by Berghahn Books, and is currently co-editing with Lucy Mazdon a forthcoming anthology of essays on Anglo-French Cinematic relations. She is also a regular contributor to /Sight and Sound/ magazine.

*Emma Wilson* is Reader in Contemporary French Literature and Film at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of Corpus Christi College. Her recent publications include /Alain Resnais/ (Manchester University Press, 2006) and /Atom Egoyan/ (Illinois University Press, 2009).