French Film Festival — A–Z of films

Trots, sometimes quite outrageously, along the thin line between the pretentious and the profound and never really falls into either camp.

Though well executed, there isn’t a great deal to elevate the story beyond a solid genre piece.

Lanners' script is witty and moves at a steady pace.

Hansen-Love prefers to make her points through gesture and nuance and the film is all the better for it.

A low-key gem.

Anne Fontaine and co-scribe Benoît Graffin simply cannot make up their minds.

Benchetrit keeps a firm hand on the tiller, despite some of the film's more wild flights of fancy - including a perfectly pitched homage to silent film.

The film is at its best when Tati is on his own with a simple prop like the bike, when his distinctive personality comes to the fore.

There are moments of brilliance but also points where Tati simply lays on everything too thick.

An unlikely, but highly effective, marriage of arthouse and mainstream sensibilities.

The juxtaposition between comedy and meditation on contemporary life does throw the viewer off-guard a little bit, but it is no the less effective for doing so.

The most striking thing about Robinson's Place is how much energy it has considering it is, for the most part, a study of ennui.

There is a sense of creeping change rather than glorious revolution - even as Daniel begins to have a growing self-awareness, this need not necessarily lead to an immediate alteration of attitude towards life.

The overall effect is touching without being sentimental.

By keeping the focus firmly on the personal relationship between the two men Lioret lifts his story out of cliche and into a place where emotions flourish.