jaferacer's - Rented List

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Made barely a year after Claude Chabrol's debut Le Beau Serge, Les Cousins featured the earlier film's same starring pair of Jean - Claude Brialy and Gérard Blain, here reversing the good-guy/bad-guy roles of the previous picture.

The result is a simmering, venomous study in human temperament that not only won the Golden Bear at the 1959 Berlin Film Festival, but also drew audiences in droves, and effectively launched Chabrol's incredible fifty-year-long career.
In Les Cousins, Blain's character journeys from the country to Paris to crash at the luxurious flat of his worldly and decadent cousin, portrayed by Brialy, during the study period for an upcoming law exam which both have set out to undertake. It becomes clear soon enough that only one of the cousins is terribly committed to his work; as sexual promises and alcohol intervene, the set-up becomes untenable for the provincial, - and a tragic slide ensues.
A gripping and urbane examination of city and country, ambition and ease, Les Cousins continues to captivate and shock audiences with its brilliant scenario, the performances of Brialy and Blain, and the assuredness of Chabrol's precocious directorial hand.

A famous torch song singer returns to Spain from Mexico with the hope of being reunited with the daughter she previously abandoned. On her arrival she discovers her daughter is planning to marry one of her ex-lovers, a situation that can only end with murder.

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Small-time crooks Victor (Michele Serrault) and Betty (Isabelle Huppert) live their lives on the road, conning money out of businessmen but staying under the radar by taking no more than their victims can afford.

Until the day when Betty hooks a big fish (Francois Cluzet) linked to international money trafficking, and they find themselves in over their heads. Who is scamming who and who do you trust in a life built on so many lies?

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On stepping off the bus from Paris, François (Jean-Claude Brialy) quickly registers that life in his native village, Sardent, has moved on. Beneath the calm surface, an explosive cocktail of gossip, boredom, and repressed sexuality has fermented.

Ostensibly back to recuperate from a bout of tuberculosis, François soon embarks on an almost religious quest to save his former close friend Serge (Gérard Blain) from self-destructive despair and alcoholism, and so the film resonates with Christian overtones of suffering, redemption and salvation. But it's not long before François falls into the arms and bed of the voluptuous Marie (Bernadette Laffont), thereby fuelling the villagers' mounting hostility to what they widely perceive as intrusive meddling.

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Bergman's second film, a romantic drama set in post-war Sweden, remains a solid example of the auteur's early work. Maggi and David, two outsiders with troubled pasts, meet by chance at a railway station and fall in love.

They decide to start a new life together, but their happiness comes under threat from a series of misfortunes and set backs. Distinguished by excellent performances and assured direction, 'It Rains on Our Love' is an affecting portrait of the bond between two people and a damning critique of the closed-mindedness of the period.

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Eighteen-year-old Nelly (Inga Landgré) lives a quiet life in a small town with her foster mother. There, she makes a living giving piano lessons and letting a room to Ulf (Allan Bohlin), who is in love with her.

Despite her financial problems, Nelly's foster mother manages to save enough money to buy Nelly a new dress to wear at a charity ball. However, when Nelly's real mother, Jenny (Marianne Löfgren), also buys a dress, Nelly wears this instead. Attracted by the glamorous garment and the promise of a more exciting life, Nelly leaves the small town to join her mother in Stockholm. Once there, she soon discovers that there is a darker side to human nature that she never knew existed when she lived in a small town.

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Torment (aka Frenzy) was based on Ingmar Bergman's first screenplay and was directed by another great Swedish director, Alf Sjoberg.

The film charts the relationship between sensitive school boy Jan-Erik (Alf Kjellin), his sadistic overbearing school master nicknamed Caligula (Stig Jarrel), and his older girlfriend Bertha (Mai Zetterling). Jan-Erik discovers that he is not the only man Bertha is seeing, is being stalked and harassed by a mysterious older man. A visit to Bertha prompts a confrontation with his school master which leads to the boy making strong indictments against the master and the master becoming increasingly vindictive. Set at the height of World War 2 the character of Caligula was based hevaily upon Heinrich Himmler and portrays him as a character of weakness using cruelty to cover his shortcomings. The harsh pessimism and darkly surreal visuals offer a glimpse into the brilliance that Bergman would show in his later works.

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Paul (François Cluzet) and Nelly (Emmanuelle Béart) have what appears to be the perfect life; happily married, a wonderful son and a successful business in their idyllic lakeside hotel. For Paul it all seems too perfect and he begins to suspect his wife of having an affair.

Tormented by nightmares and visions his paranoia soon threatens Nelly as his jealousy descends into madness.

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Henri Marcoux (Jacques Dacqmine), a respectable middle-class man living in Provence with his wife and two children, is having an affair with a younger woman, Leda (Antonella Lualdi).

His wife, the redoubtable Therese Marcoux (Madeleine Robinson), is determined to avoid a scandal at any price, even to the extent of breaking off her daughter's engagement when she learns that her future son-in-law Laszlo (Jean-Paul Belmondo) has been sympathising with her husband. Then the unthinkable happens - Leda is found dead. But who is the killer?