Claude Sautet: The Things of Life
Tickets
See any two films in the series and save when you create your own Double Feature! (Note: Package discount not include Max et les Ferrailleurs screenings.)
“Claude Sautet makes movies the way people live—he traces the connections between the mistakes, and celebrates the occasional victories.” —Roger Ebert
Hailed as a master by the likes of Jean-Pierre Melville, François Truffaut and Pauline Kael, his films a steady presence at art-house cinemas throughout the 1970s, ‘80s and ‘90s, writer-director Claude Sautet (1924-2000) remains curiously absent from most discussions of major postwar French filmmakers. Perhaps that is because Sautet’s work defies easy categorization. A contemporary of the Nouvelle Vague without being part of it, and a successful “script doctor” who lent his expertise to many popular commercial entertainments, Sautet was as astute at mapping the private lives of small-time gangsters as he was at depicting the ups and downs of the haute bourgeoisie. Along the way he formed lasting partnerships with many of the greatest French stars of the era, including Yves Montand (3 films), Michel Piccoli (5 films), and his muse, the luminous Romy Schneider (5 films), before experiencing a late-career renaissance with a trilogy of romantic dramas made using a new generation of leading men and women (including Daniel Auteuil, Emmanuelle Béart and Sandrine Bonnaire). We are pleased to present this long overdue survey of Sautet’s remarkable career, including the U.S. theatrical premiere of his masterpiece, Max et les Ferrailleurs. Series programmed by Scott Foundas.
Funding for this series was made possible with the generous support of the Grand Marnier Foundation.
KAUFMAN, PHILIP
Title: KAUFMAN, PHILIP ¥ Pers: KEITEL, HARVEY / KAUFMAN, PHILIP ¥ Year: 1993 ¥ Ref: XKA035AD ¥ Credit: [ 20TH CENTURY FOX / THE KOBAL COLLECTION ]…
The Bad Son
Not on DVD!
Sautet’s only film set in the working-class world of his own childhood follows the son (Patrick Dewaere) of a construction foreman as he returns home and tries to start his life anew after serving a five-year drug sentence in an American prison.
César and Rosalie
A free-spirited divorcée (Romy Schneider) juggles her affections for a wealthy industrialist (Yves Montand) with those for a cartoonist (Sami Frey) from her past in this spirited ménage à trois, co-starring a young Isabelle Huppert in one of her earliest screen appearances.
Classe tous risques
Sautet’s true first feature (after the disavowed job-for-hire Bonjour Sourire) stars Lino Ventura as a fugitive gangster returning to the Parisian underworld after a decade on the lam, with help from Mob errand boy Jean-Paul Belmondo (in his first post-Breathless role).
Claude Sautet or The Invisible Magic
Film critic N.T. Binh combined hours of audio interviews with Sautet (recorded as he was dying of cancer) with reminiscences from friends and collaborators for this revealing portrait of the man and his films.
The Dictator’s Guns
New digital restoration with new English subtitles! Not on DVD!
In this rousing action thriller—Sautet’s last exercise in pure “genre” filmmaking—skipper Lino Ventura and seductive heiress Sylva Koscina becomes ensnared in an American mercenary’s plot to transport a boatload of illegal weapons.
A Few Days with Me
Not on DVD!
Sautet hit a late-career stride with this delightful tale of an eccentric scion (Daniel Auteuil) of a supermarket-owning family who enters into a Pygmalion-style relationship with a Limoges housemaid (Sandrine Bonnaire) and her blue-collar boyfriend (Vincent Lindon).
Garçon!
Not on DVD!
In his third and final collaboration with Sautet, the great Yves Montand stars as an aging head waiter in a chic Parisian bistro, juggling hot plates and the myriad beautiful women in his life.
A Heart in Winter
Sautet won the SIlver Lion at the Venice Film Festival for this heartbreaking romantic drama about a violin virtuoso (Emmanuelle Béart) torn between the rival affections of two business partners: the outgoing Maxime (André Dussollier) and the emotionally withdrawn Stéphane (Daniel Auteuil).
Mado
A debt-addled land developer (Michel Piccoli) and his prostitute lover (Ottavia Piccolo) hatch a plan for him to maintain control of his company—and his life—in Sautet’s richly textured drama of love in the time of capitalism.
Max et les Ferrailleurs
Extended by popular demand!
Never before released in U.S. theaters, Claude Sautet’s elegant and sophisticated crime drama stars the great Michel Piccoli as a Paris detective who poses as a wealthy banker to lure a petty crook and his gang into committing a bank robbery ... so that he can then catch them red-handed. But there’s one thing the detective doesn’t plan for: falling in love with his intended victim’s beautiful moll (Romy Schneider). A Rialto Pictures release.
Nelly and Monsieur Arnaud
Sautet’s masterful final feature depicts the unusual, not-quite romantic friendship that blossoms between a lonely old man (the great Michel Serrault) and the beautiful young woman (Emmanuelle Béart) he hires to transcribe his memoirs.
A Simple Story
Not on DVD!
Romy Schneider gives a stunning performance as a middle-aged divorcée who decides to leave her lover (Claude Brasseur) and return to her husband (Bruno Cremer) in this Oscar-nominated Sautet classic.
The Things of Life
Not on DVD!
In the aftermath of a car crash, a man (Michel Piccoli) flashes back on the disparate fragments of his life—chiefly his relationships with wife Léa Massari and mistress Romy Schneider—in the stylish melodrama that cemented Sautet’s international reputation.
Vincent, François, Paul and the Others
Not on DVD!
Three lifelong friends—a writer (Serge Reggiani), a businessman (Yves Montand) and a doctor (Michel Piccoli)—find themselves waylaid by disappointment as they approach middle age in this sharply observed character study. Co-starring Gérard Depardieu.
