alr

The Life of Jesus
(La Vie de Jèsus)

Director in Person
Screening on Film
Directed by Bruno Dumont .
With Sébastien Bailleul, Samuel Boidin, Geneviéve Cottreel.
France, 1997, 35mm, color, 96 min.
French with English subtitles.

A shocker at Cannes because of its unromanticized coverage of real sex, Bruno Dumont's provocatively-titled, Cinemascope film is about a group of misdirected friends in the Northern French countryside. It centers on epileptic, chronically unemployed Freddy, his intense couplings with sexy Marie, and his motorcycle rides with his bored, nothing-else-to-do pals. One day, an Arab boy appears in the town, and has eyes for Marie. Racism and revenge follow. Dumont used local, non-professional actors to create a naturalistic portrait of rural Flanders for one of the most critically praised French films of recent years.
 

Part of film series

Read more

On Set with French Cinema: Bruno Dumont

Read more

Contemporary French Cinema

Other film series with this film

Read more

The Cutting Edge

Current and upcoming film series

Read more

Música de Câmara. The Cinema of Rita Azevedo Gomes

Read more

From the Harvard Film Archive Collection …

Read more

People and their Virtue. Two Films by Wang Bing

Read more

Trenque Lauquen by Laura Citarella

Read more

I Heard It Through the Grapevine with James Baldwin

Read more

Filmmaker, Guest Worker: Zelimir Zilnik’s Expatriates

Read more

Adachi Masao’s Revolution+1

Read more

Out of the Ashes – The US-ROK Security Alliance & the Emergence of South Korean Cinema

Read more

Songs of Love and Loss. Elvira Notari’s Cinematic Realism