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One of the most puzzling (non-) happenings in international cinema this year is the lack of U.S. distribution for Philippe Garrel’s stellar new drama The Plough. A family affair starring Louis Garrel, Damien Mongin, Esther Garrel, Lena Garrel, Francine Bergé Aurélien Recoing, Mathilde Weil, and Asma Messaoudene, the film about a company of puppeteers premiered at Berlinale this year and is still looking for a home here. However, it’ll open in France this September, and with it the first trailer has arrived.

Rory O’Connor said in his Berlinale review, “In 1947, ten years before becoming an actor, Philippe Garrel’s father, Maurice, joined a company of puppeteers. That piece of history is like a well of inspiration in The Plough, Garrel’s latest cinematic family affair and a film as effortless as they come. It stars all three of Philippe’s children––Louie, Lena, and Esther––as brother...

In 1947, ten years before becoming an actor, Philippe Garrel’s father, Maurice, joined a company of puppeteers. That piece of history is like a well of inspiration in The Plough, Garrel’s latest cinematic family affair and a film as effortless as they come. It stars all three of Philippe’s children––Louie, Lena, and Esther––as brother and sisters; the patriarch role is filled by Louie’s godfather, Aurélien Recoing, whose own father worked alongside Maurice all those years ago. The grandmother is played by Francine Bergé––no relation, but maybe the performance of the lot. A briskly charming, bracingly anachronistic, sometimes achingly sensual film, it tracks the company in their late halcyon days as well as the siblings’ strained attempts to keep things going once their father dies.

Curiously, The Plough is Garrel’s first color film since A Burning Hot Summer, a maligned work from 2011 that was,...

Given the reportedly frequent use of puppets as aids to the therapeutic process, one might expect a family of third-generation puppeteers to be among the most well-adjusted people in the world. Or among the least, given the other connotation of puppetry, as a conduit for demonic, psychotic or otherwise malign energies. Sadly, neither is the case with the clan in Philippe Garrel’s “The Plough,” a featherweight folderol even by the director’s uneven recent standards, which seems mainly conceived as a cozy way for the veteran director to spend a little time reminding his real-life family how much they will miss him when he’s gone. It’s all about relationships but for anyone not surnamed Garrel, trying to find anything much to relate to in “The Plough” is a lonely furrow indeed.

Le Grand Chariot is the puppet theater run by Simon (Aurélien Recoing) alongside his aspiring actor...

Writer, director and occasional actor Philippe Garrel shot his first full-length movie, Marie pour mémoire, when he was only 19. That was amid the turmoil of May 1968, and since then he has made a new feature every few years, becoming a regular fixture in festivals and arthouses, especially in his native France.

Working with unknown or established actors, including Catherine Deneuve and Jean-Pierre Léaud, his intimate tales of emotional unrest — often the same story told again and again, during different epochs, in color or black-and-white — have turned him into a dependable auteur but also an acquired taste. If you don’t like French movies about love, sex, family, adultery and anguish, then you probably won’t like Garrel.

His work has always had an autobiographical bent to it, and one of his best films, 1970’s La Cicatrice Intérieure, starred his girlfriend at the time, Nico of The Velvet Underground. But his latest feature,...

The Berlin Film Festival on Monday unveiled the titles selected for its official competition as well as its sidebar Encounters competitive section.

A total of 18 films have been selected for the international competition with highlights including Christian Petzold’s latest film Roter Himmel (Afire), Margarethe von Trotta directing Phantom Thread star Vicky Krieps in Ingeborg Bachmann — Journey Into the Desert, and Philippe Garrel returns with a new feature titled The Plough.

Scroll down for the full lineup.

This morning the festival also revealed an extra special screening: Actor and filmmaker Sean Penn will debut a documentary titled Superpower, a film shot in Ukraine last year at the outbreak of Russia’s invasion and follows president Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

The Berlin Film Festival takes place February 16-26.

Organizers have already announced more than 100 titles across sidebars spanning Panorama, Forum, and Berlinale Special. The festival had initially done a good job of increasing...

Le Grande Chariot

Cinema for the Garrels has always been a family affair but Philippe Garrel‘s 28th features feel a tad more special. Starring Louis Garrel, Esther Garrel, Léna Garrel, Aurélien Recoing, Damien Mongin, Francine Bergé, Mathilde Weil, Asma Messaoudene and marionette artists, Le Grande Chariot (formerly known as “La lune crevée”) moved into production early in 2022. Written by the director alongside Jean-Claude Carrière, Arlette Langmann and Caroline Deruas, the story charts the fantastic yet tragic destiny of three puppet artist siblings.

Gist: Three siblings, a father and a grandmother who run a travelling puppet show. When the father dies during a performance, the remaining family members try to keep his legacy alive.…...

As of late the work of prolific French director Philippe Garrel has gone a bit unappreciated here in the States, the perceived notion being that he keeps recycling the same themes with little invention. For those who don’t prescribe to that theory (e.g. this writer) the announcement of a new project still carries much anticipation.

Such is the case for his next film La lune crevée (roughly translated to The Burst Moon), which was first reported on late last year but we’re getting wind of thanks to new funding from Cnc (via Cineuropa). Set to once again be a family affair, the director’s 28th film stars his three children as well as Aurélien Recoing, Damien Mongin, Francine Bergé, Mathilde Weil, and Asma Messaoudene.

Co-written by Garrel, Jean-Claude Carrière (Rip), Arlette Langmann, and Caroline Deruas, the plot will tell “the romantic and tragic destiny of a family of puppeteer artists,...