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French film promotional organization Unifrance put talent in the spotlight at this year’s Rendez-Vous in Paris, where the 10 actors and filmmakers selected as 2024’s Talents to Watch were fêted with flutes of champagne at France’s Ministry of Culture before being introduced to the international press at a dedicated event.

For more than a decade, the 10 to Watch program has pinpointed the creative talents breathing modernity and vitality into contemporary French cinema. Think of a Gallic artist that’s made international waves over the past decade, and chances are they made this list. Here are the voices taking the industry forward in the years to come.

Sofia Alaoui

Sofia Alaoui

Franco-Moroccan filmmaker Sofia Alaoui will build on the rugged eeriness of her 2023 Sundance jury prize winner “Animalia” with “Tarfaya” – a slow-burn thriller that mines Morocco’s sweeping landscapes for ambient unease.

The upcoming film will follow Meryam, a 40-something...

This podcast focuses on Criterion’s Eclipse Series of DVDs. Hosts David Blakeslee and Trevor Berrett give an overview of each box and offer their perspectives on the unique treasures they find inside. In this episode, David and Trevor discuss Eclipse Series 16: Alexander Korda’s Private Lives.

About the films:

Though born to modest means in Hungary, Alexander Korda would go on to become one of the most important filmmakers in the history of British cinema. A producer, writer, and director who navigated toward subjects of major historical significance and mythical distinction, Korda made a name for his production company, London Films, with the Oscar-winning The Private Life of Henry VIII. He then continued his populist investigation behind the scenes and in the bedrooms of such figures as Catherine the Great, Don Juan, and Rembrandt. Mixing stately period drama with surprising satire, these films are exemplars of grand 1930s moviemaking.

Above: Us three-sheet poster for The Private Life of Henry VIII (Alexander Korda, UK, 1933).

The great Charles Laughton may not have been the prettiest of movie stars, but he had a presence that many matinee idols would have killed for (as the current retrospective running at Film Forum will attest). In an era in which glamor was everything, studio marketers may have struggled with how to present Laughton’s unconventional looks and his larger-than-life portrayals of larger-than-life characters (so many monsters, murderers, tyrants, or simply overbearing fathers) to the public. In most of the posters for his most famous film, The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939), he is all but a silhouette, a spoiler alert to his monstrous transformation as Quasimodo. And in some posters for The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933), the film for which he won his first Oscar, Henry is made to look more like the Hans Holbein...

Best British movies of all time? (Image: a young Michael Caine in 'Get Carter') Ten years ago, Get Carter, starring Michael Caine as a dangerous-looking London gangster (see photo above), was selected as the United Kingdom's very best movie of all time according to 25 British film critics polled by Total Film magazine. To say that Mike Hodges' 1971 thriller was a surprising choice would be an understatement. I mean, not a David Lean epic or an early Alfred Hitchcock thriller? What a difference ten years make. On Total Film's 2014 list, published last May, Get Carter was no. 44 among the magazine's Top 50 best British movies of all time. How could that be? Well, first of all, people would be very naive if they took such lists seriously, whether we're talking Total Film, the British Film Institute, or, to keep things British, Sight & Sound magazine. Second, whereas Total Film's 2004 list was the result of a 25-critic consensus,...

Stuart Freeborn, the makeup artist who designed Yoda, Chewbacca and a number of other memorable "Star Wars" characters, died Wednesday in England. He was 98. Freeborn began his six-decade career in the movie business with uncredited work on 1936's "Rembrandt" before creating makeup magic for 75 other films, including "Oliver Twist," "Dr. Strangelove," 2001: A Space Odyssey," four "Superman" films and the original "Star Wars" trilogy. Also read: Disney Planning 'Star Wars' Spin-Off Films "Stuart was already a makeup legend when he started on 'Star Wars,'" George Lucas said in a statement on StarWars.com.

Release Date: Oct. 11, 2011

Price: DVD $29.95, Blu-ray $39.95

Studio: Criterion

The spectacular 1939 Technicolor epic The Four Feathers, directed by Zoltán Korda (Jungle Book), is considered the finest of the many adaptations of A.E.W. Mason’s classic 1902 adventure novel about the British Empire’s exploits in Africa.

Set at the end of the 19th century, the adventure film follows the travails of a young officer (John Clements, Rembrandt) accused of cowardice after he resigns his post on the eve of a major deployment to Khartoum. Ultimately, he must fight to redeem himself in the eyes of his fellow officers and fiancée (June Duprez, The Thief of Bagdad).

Featuring music by Miklós Rózsa (The Killers) and Oscar-nominated cinematography by Georges Périnal (The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp), The Four Feathers remains a timeless, thunderous movie epic.

The film was remade by Shekhar Kapur in 2002. Not nearly as invigorating as the Korda version, the...

This coming Friday, July 15, marks the birthday of the greatest of all Dutch painters, Rembrandt van Rijn. Born 505 years ago, I figured now was as suitable an occasion as I’d ever have to review Rembrandt, this fine biopic from 1936 starring Charles Laughton, part of Eclipse Series 16: Alexander Korda’s Private Lives.

Korda is one of the most influential and dynamic figures in the history of UK cinema, founder of London Films and the first man ever granted knighthood for his work in the English film industry. Along with his brothers Zoltan and Vincent, he played a major part in creating some of the most fondly remembered British films of the 1930s, 40s and 50s, including The Scarlet Pimpernel, The Four Feathers, That Hamilton Woman, The Thief of Bagdad, The Third Man and Laurence Olivier’s version of Richard III.

As anyone who’s paid even the slightest attention...