Judith (Virginie Efira) with little Ninon (Loïse Benguerel) in Antoine Barraud’s mysterious Madeleine Collins
Antoine Barraud’s Madeleine Collins, written in collaboration with Héléna Klotz, starring Virginie Efira, Quim Gutiérrez, Bruno Salomone with Jacqueline Bisset, François Rostain, Loïse Benguerel, Thomas Gioria, Théo Deroo, Nadav Lapid, Nathalie Boutefeu, Mona Walravens, Frank Onana, and Valérie Donzelli is a highlight of Rendez-Vous with French Cinema and the Glasgow Film Festival.
Antoine Barraud with Anne-Katrin Titze on Maurice Pialat filming his son for Le garçu: “He said when you direct a child, it’s actually the child directing you.”
Before Antoine arrived in New York, we discussed casting Bertrand Bonello and Barbet Schroeder, the long tradition of having women’s names as film titles, novels and plays to name just a few. In Antoine Barraud’s Portrait Of The Artist, Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo loomed large and we explore the unconscious mind of...
Antoine Barraud’s Madeleine Collins, written in collaboration with Héléna Klotz, starring Virginie Efira, Quim Gutiérrez, Bruno Salomone with Jacqueline Bisset, François Rostain, Loïse Benguerel, Thomas Gioria, Théo Deroo, Nadav Lapid, Nathalie Boutefeu, Mona Walravens, Frank Onana, and Valérie Donzelli is a highlight of Rendez-Vous with French Cinema and the Glasgow Film Festival.
Antoine Barraud with Anne-Katrin Titze on Maurice Pialat filming his son for Le garçu: “He said when you direct a child, it’s actually the child directing you.”
Before Antoine arrived in New York, we discussed casting Bertrand Bonello and Barbet Schroeder, the long tradition of having women’s names as film titles, novels and plays to name just a few. In Antoine Barraud’s Portrait Of The Artist, Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo loomed large and we explore the unconscious mind of...
- 3/7/2022
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
A philosopher once said that despair can never be dissolved through escape, but by observing it. There isn’t much in terms of reprieve Locarno and Sitges preemed amour fou Adoration — a tale of first love where the stakes are so high, and the bound so instantly strong that the perilous journey ahead for teen twosome Paul (Thomas Gioria of Xavier Legrand’s Jusqu’à la garde) and Gloria (Fantine Harduin of Haneke’s Happy End) is highjacked of moments of amnesty. This pairing are unlikely to come out unscathed.
Settling into his sixth feature film (final instalment in the Ardennes trilogy), Fabrice du Welz delves into notions of attachment and while not as fiery as the spiritual predecessor in Alleluia, we become witness to the lengths (or obsessiveness) one is willing to go to defend their first.…...
Settling into his sixth feature film (final instalment in the Ardennes trilogy), Fabrice du Welz delves into notions of attachment and while not as fiery as the spiritual predecessor in Alleluia, we become witness to the lengths (or obsessiveness) one is willing to go to defend their first.…...
- 6/30/2021
- by Eric Lavallée
- IONCINEMA.com
"What do you feel for me?" Altered Innocence has debuted the US trailer for the Belgian film Adoration, which originally premiered at the Locarno Film Festival in 2019, and also stopped by L'Étrange, Sitges, and Fantastic Fest that year. This is the final film of Fabrice du Welz's "Ardennes trilogy", following Calvaire (2004) and Alleluia (2014). The film follows shy 12-year old Paul who lives near a psychiatric institute. After an encounter with a young patient there, the troubled yet beautiful Gloria, he becomes infatuated and vows to protect her. Insisting doctors are holding her hostage for an inheritance the two escape and wreak havoc across the French countryside. Described as "a potent combination of violent thriller and romantic sexual awakening, du Welz masterfully captures the teenage intensity of 'amour fou' pairing perfectly with Manuel Dacosse's sumptuous 16mm photography." With Thomas Gioria & Fantine Harduin as Paul & Gloria, Benoît Poelvoorde, Anaël Snoek,...
- 5/7/2021
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Altered Innocence has picked up U.S. rights to Fabrice du Welz’s dark contemporary fairytale “Adoration,” which premiered at Locarno Film Festival. A release is planned for summer.
“Adoration” combines a violent thriller with a romantic sexual awakening story, capturing the teenage intensity of “amour fou.” It features rising stars Thomas Gioria (“Custody”) and Fantine Harduin (Michael Haneke’s “Happy End”). The film is the finale to the director’s Ardennes trilogy, following “Calvaire” and “Alleluia.”
As well as Locarno, the film played at leading genre festivals such as Fantastic Fest and Sitges, where it won the Special Prize of the Jury, and Rotterdam.
The film follows shy 12-year-old Paul who lives near a psychiatric institute. After an encounter with a patient there, the troubled yet beautiful Gloria, he becomes infatuated and vows to protect her. Insisting the doctors are holding her hostage for an inheritance, the two escape...
“Adoration” combines a violent thriller with a romantic sexual awakening story, capturing the teenage intensity of “amour fou.” It features rising stars Thomas Gioria (“Custody”) and Fantine Harduin (Michael Haneke’s “Happy End”). The film is the finale to the director’s Ardennes trilogy, following “Calvaire” and “Alleluia.”
As well as Locarno, the film played at leading genre festivals such as Fantastic Fest and Sitges, where it won the Special Prize of the Jury, and Rotterdam.
The film follows shy 12-year-old Paul who lives near a psychiatric institute. After an encounter with a patient there, the troubled yet beautiful Gloria, he becomes infatuated and vows to protect her. Insisting the doctors are holding her hostage for an inheritance, the two escape...
- 1/20/2021
- by Leo Barraclough
- Variety Film + TV
Belgian director Fabrice du Welz is known for his extremely violent and gory films, which typically reach a fever-pitch of intensity if they do not start from an already nerve-wracking place. His aesthetic project is one of confrontation, and his interest lies in exploring limit-experiences of intense emotions and sensations, of the kind which produce both psychological and physical pain. Already in his phenomenal 1999 short film A Wonderful Love, he centers on an ordinary and unassuming woman, living in a disgusting apartment, who “falls in love” with the corpse of a male stripper she accidentally murdered. It is gruesome, funny, sweet, and disturbing all at the same time. His early feature films were part of a similar project and share this wonderful, productive collision of tones, Calvaire (2004) projecting the psychosexual hang-ups of its main character onto a brutish fight for survival in a rural hellscape, Vinyan (2008) following a grieving couple...
- 1/25/2020
- MUBI
For over 15 years, Belgian director Fabrice du Welz has been thrilling and challenging audiences with his transgressive genre features like Calvaire and Alléluia. With his latest film, Adoration, he explores the coming of age of 12-year-old Paul (Thomas Gioria), who lives on the grounds of a psychiatric hospital with his mother. Paul quickly becomes infatuated with a new patient, Gloria (Fantine Harduin), and together, they run away and embark on a strange sun-kissed journey. While touched with the golden light of summer, the film probes into the darker side of first love. Love isn’t demonized, but it’s not romanticized either. For Paul, love disturbs his comfortable life and challenges the way he sees the world. As his dealings with Gloria become more difficult due...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
- 10/25/2019
- Screen Anarchy
Thriller evolves around a crazed and destructive love story between two teenagers who meet at a psychiatric hospital.
Memento Films International has boarded sales on Belgian director Fabrice du Welz’s thriller Adoration ahead of its premiere on the Locarno Film Festival’s Piazza Grande in August.
It is the final film in du Welz’s Ardennes trilogy set against the backdrop of the rugged, forested region spanning southeast Belgium, Luxembourg, France and Germany.
It revolves around a crazed and destructive love story between two teenagers who meet at a psychiatric hospital and embark on a dangerous trip together.
The...
Memento Films International has boarded sales on Belgian director Fabrice du Welz’s thriller Adoration ahead of its premiere on the Locarno Film Festival’s Piazza Grande in August.
It is the final film in du Welz’s Ardennes trilogy set against the backdrop of the rugged, forested region spanning southeast Belgium, Luxembourg, France and Germany.
It revolves around a crazed and destructive love story between two teenagers who meet at a psychiatric hospital and embark on a dangerous trip together.
The...
- 7/17/2019
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- ScreenDaily
The centre has announced the results of its first committee of 2019; it is throwing its weight behind 17 new features. The Wallonia-Brussels Federation Film Centre is lending its support to 48 new film projects, 17 of which are features. Most notably, production support has been granted to the new movie by Fabrice du Welz. While we wait with bated breath for the autumn release of his latest film, Adoration, which stars Thomas Gioria, Fantine Harduin and Benoît Poelvoorde (see the interview), the director will also be shooting his new outing, Inexorable, over the same period. It follows the trials and tribulations of Marcel Bellmer, a famous author who, ever since the staggering success of his first novel, has never really managed to bounce back. The sudden and unexpected appearance of Gloria, a young cleaning lady who reminds him uncannily of his first love, will drag him into a vicious...
Xavier Legrand’s feature debut “Custody,” a tense portrait of a family torn by domestic violence, won best film, actress (for Lea Drucker), and original screenplay at the 44th Cesar Awards, which took place at the Salle Pleyel in Paris. The awards are France’s highest film honors.
“Custody,” which marks Legrand’s follow up to his Oscar-nominated short, tells the story of a boy named Julien (Thomas Gioria), who is forced by a court ruling to split his time between his mother (Drucker) and estranged father (Denis Ménochet), whom he regards as a violent monster, amid his parents’ bitter divorce. “Custody” world-premiered in competition at the Venice Film Festival, where it won two awards, and went on to play at Toronto in the competitive Platform section.
In her speech, Drucker paid homage to all the brave women who have inspired her and also dedicated the award to women who...
“Custody,” which marks Legrand’s follow up to his Oscar-nominated short, tells the story of a boy named Julien (Thomas Gioria), who is forced by a court ruling to split his time between his mother (Drucker) and estranged father (Denis Ménochet), whom he regards as a violent monster, amid his parents’ bitter divorce. “Custody” world-premiered in competition at the Venice Film Festival, where it won two awards, and went on to play at Toronto in the competitive Platform section.
In her speech, Drucker paid homage to all the brave women who have inspired her and also dedicated the award to women who...
- 2/22/2019
- by Elsa Keslassy
- Variety Film + TV
With a seemingly endless amount of streaming options — not only the titles at our disposal, but services themselves — we’re highlighting the noteworthy titles that have recently hit platforms. Check out this week’s selections below and an archive of past round-ups here.
Can You Ever Forgive Me? (Marielle Heller)
Do you have a Lee Israel work on your shelf? What should be a matter of owning one of her books or not since she was a notable author of biographies who hit the New York Times Best Sellers list, things get much more complicated when you look closer to see she wrote more than just about the likes of Dorothy Kilgallen and Estée Lauder. Israel also wrote as some of her subjects too. During the early 1990s when she was down on her luck professionally, financially, and personally, a fateful discovery occurred that would ultimately ensure her name would...
Can You Ever Forgive Me? (Marielle Heller)
Do you have a Lee Israel work on your shelf? What should be a matter of owning one of her books or not since she was a notable author of biographies who hit the New York Times Best Sellers list, things get much more complicated when you look closer to see she wrote more than just about the likes of Dorothy Kilgallen and Estée Lauder. Israel also wrote as some of her subjects too. During the early 1990s when she was down on her luck professionally, financially, and personally, a fateful discovery occurred that would ultimately ensure her name would...
- 2/8/2019
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
France’s Académie des Arts et Techniques du Cinéma unveiled its nominations for the César Awards this morning in Paris. The races for the country’s Oscar equivalent are led by Xavier Legrand’s feature debut Jusqu’à La Garde (Custody) and Gilles Lellouche’s Le Grand Bain (Sink Or Swim) with 10 mentions each. They are followed by Jacques Audiard’s English-language western, The Sisters Brothers, and Pierre Salvadori’s En Liberté! (The Trouble With You) with nine a piece. All four are in the Best Picture and Director categories.
There’s a noticeably lighter edge to the nominations this year with Le Grand Bain a sort of Full Monty à la française that sees a group of middle-aged men form a synchronized swimming team. The movie debuted out of competition in Cannes and became the 3rd highest grossing local title of 2018 with over 5M tickets sold.
Also out of Cannes,...
There’s a noticeably lighter edge to the nominations this year with Le Grand Bain a sort of Full Monty à la française that sees a group of middle-aged men form a synchronized swimming team. The movie debuted out of competition in Cannes and became the 3rd highest grossing local title of 2018 with over 5M tickets sold.
Also out of Cannes,...
- 1/23/2019
- by Nancy Tartaglione
- Deadline Film + TV
French actor-turned-director Gilles Lellouche’s “Sink or Swim” and Xavier Legrand’s feature debut “Custody” lead the race for this year’s Cesar Awards, France’s equivalent of the Oscars, with 10 nominations each, including best picture and best director.
“Sink or Swim” (“Le Grand Bain” in France), a star-driven dramedy about a men’s synchronized swimming team, world-premiered at Cannes out of competition and was released by Studiocanal. The ensemble film, which was one of the highest-grossing French films in 2018, picked up multiple nominations in the best supporting actor and actress categories, for Jean-Hugues Anglade, Philippe Katerine, Leila Bekhti and Virginie Efira.
“Custody” follows a boy named Julien (Thomas Gioria), who is forced by a court ruling to split his time between his mother (Léa Drucker) and estranged father (Denis Ménochet), whom he regards as a violent monster, amid his parents’ bitter divorce. “Custody” world-premiered in competition at the Venice Film Festival,...
“Sink or Swim” (“Le Grand Bain” in France), a star-driven dramedy about a men’s synchronized swimming team, world-premiered at Cannes out of competition and was released by Studiocanal. The ensemble film, which was one of the highest-grossing French films in 2018, picked up multiple nominations in the best supporting actor and actress categories, for Jean-Hugues Anglade, Philippe Katerine, Leila Bekhti and Virginie Efira.
“Custody” follows a boy named Julien (Thomas Gioria), who is forced by a court ruling to split his time between his mother (Léa Drucker) and estranged father (Denis Ménochet), whom he regards as a violent monster, amid his parents’ bitter divorce. “Custody” world-premiered in competition at the Venice Film Festival,...
- 1/23/2019
- by Elsa Keslassy
- Variety Film + TV
Adoration
Belgian provocateur Fabrice du Welz returns with Adoration, the third chapter of his celebrated Ardennes trilogy, which follows his 2004 debut Calvaire and 2014’s delicious Alleluia (our interview)—both titles which the director is perhaps best known for in the Us. Having taken recent trips abroad, including the troubled French production of 2014’s Colt 45 and du Welz’s English language debut Message from the King (available on Netflix), du Welz at last returns to the isolated hysteria which has marked his past Ardennes installment by reuniting with his Vinyan (2008) star Emmanuelle Beart. Also included in the fantastic cast are French icon Beatrice Dalle, Belgian actors Benoit Poelvoorde and Peter van den Begin, Haneke discovery Fantine Harduin (the troubled child of 2017’s Happy End), Xavier Legrand’s Custody breakout Thomas Gioria, and excitingly, the return of Laurent Lucas, who headlined the two previous Ardennes titles.…
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Belgian provocateur Fabrice du Welz returns with Adoration, the third chapter of his celebrated Ardennes trilogy, which follows his 2004 debut Calvaire and 2014’s delicious Alleluia (our interview)—both titles which the director is perhaps best known for in the Us. Having taken recent trips abroad, including the troubled French production of 2014’s Colt 45 and du Welz’s English language debut Message from the King (available on Netflix), du Welz at last returns to the isolated hysteria which has marked his past Ardennes installment by reuniting with his Vinyan (2008) star Emmanuelle Beart. Also included in the fantastic cast are French icon Beatrice Dalle, Belgian actors Benoit Poelvoorde and Peter van den Begin, Haneke discovery Fantine Harduin (the troubled child of 2017’s Happy End), Xavier Legrand’s Custody breakout Thomas Gioria, and excitingly, the return of Laurent Lucas, who headlined the two previous Ardennes titles.…
Continue reading.
- 1/8/2019
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
With a seemingly endless amount of streaming options — not only the titles at our disposal, but services themselves — we’re highlighting the noteworthy titles that have recently hit platforms. Check out this week’s selections below and an archive of past round-ups here.
Clouds of Sils Maria (Olivier Assayas)
Movies about making movies often get a bad rap; there’s just a presumed pretentiousness that goes along with watching filmmakers and actors defending their craft. So when it turns out that Clouds of Sils Maria is actually a beautifully directed and acted defense of the timelessness and universal value of storytelling in all forms, what could have been a European Birdman actually becomes something so much more. – Brian R.
Where to Stream: FilmStruck
Custody (Xavier Legrand)
It didn’t win the Oscar for best live action short in 2014, but Xavier Legrand’s Just Before Losing Everything was by far my favorite nominee.
Clouds of Sils Maria (Olivier Assayas)
Movies about making movies often get a bad rap; there’s just a presumed pretentiousness that goes along with watching filmmakers and actors defending their craft. So when it turns out that Clouds of Sils Maria is actually a beautifully directed and acted defense of the timelessness and universal value of storytelling in all forms, what could have been a European Birdman actually becomes something so much more. – Brian R.
Where to Stream: FilmStruck
Custody (Xavier Legrand)
It didn’t win the Oscar for best live action short in 2014, but Xavier Legrand’s Just Before Losing Everything was by far my favorite nominee.
- 9/21/2018
- by The Film Stage
- The Film Stage
To mark the release of Custody, out now, we’ve been given 3 copies to give away on Blu-ray.
After a bitter divorce, Miriam (Léa Drucker) and Antoine (Denis Ménochet) battle for sole custody of their son, Julien (Thomas Gioria). Miriam claims the father is violent but lacks proof. Antoine accuses her of manipulating their son for her own ends. Both sides seem to be hiding something with the truth buried beneath layers of deceit and jealousy. When the judge awards joint custody, an already tense situation soon brings the family’s fraught past to light. And as the truth slowly begins to emerge, a chain of events is set in motion with Julian an innocent bystander in an increasingly dangerous situation.
Please note: This competition is open to UK residents only
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The Small Print
Open to UK residents only The competition will close 17th September 2018 at 23.59 GMT...
After a bitter divorce, Miriam (Léa Drucker) and Antoine (Denis Ménochet) battle for sole custody of their son, Julien (Thomas Gioria). Miriam claims the father is violent but lacks proof. Antoine accuses her of manipulating their son for her own ends. Both sides seem to be hiding something with the truth buried beneath layers of deceit and jealousy. When the judge awards joint custody, an already tense situation soon brings the family’s fraught past to light. And as the truth slowly begins to emerge, a chain of events is set in motion with Julian an innocent bystander in an increasingly dangerous situation.
Please note: This competition is open to UK residents only
a Rafflecopter giveaway
The Small Print
Open to UK residents only The competition will close 17th September 2018 at 23.59 GMT...
- 9/5/2018
- by Competitions
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
Custody, opening in L.A. on July 13th, in New York on June 29th and going wide in August, is a heartbreakingly sad story of a boy caught between two at-war-getting-divorced parents.
On a par with Loveless, the Russian Cannes Competition film in 2017 and Oscar nominated for Best Foreigh Language Film, each of the boys, sentient but powerless, is used as a pawn. This film almost exceeds the threshold of bearable pain, so painful is to watch the father take his rages out on his son.
The boy’s (Thomas Gioria) acting is superlative. This is his first film but next year you will be able to see him in Adoration.
Denis Ménochet playing the father is also outstanding and is 100% hateful. I moaned in agony for the boy in every other scene. The father cajoles his child, blackmails his child, threatens him with force, is mecurial, cruel and unresponsive,...
On a par with Loveless, the Russian Cannes Competition film in 2017 and Oscar nominated for Best Foreigh Language Film, each of the boys, sentient but powerless, is used as a pawn. This film almost exceeds the threshold of bearable pain, so painful is to watch the father take his rages out on his son.
The boy’s (Thomas Gioria) acting is superlative. This is his first film but next year you will be able to see him in Adoration.
Denis Ménochet playing the father is also outstanding and is 100% hateful. I moaned in agony for the boy in every other scene. The father cajoles his child, blackmails his child, threatens him with force, is mecurial, cruel and unresponsive,...
- 7/16/2018
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
With influences as diverse as Kramer vs. Kramer, The Shining, and The Night of the Hunter, Xavier Legrand’s directorial debut Custody is one of the year’s most intense dramas. Also known by its French title Jusqu’à la garde, the story of a custody battle during a messy divorce earned Legrand Best Picture at the Venice Film Festival, and it’s now in theaters in NYC and will expand in the coming weeks. Courtesy of Kino Lorber, we’re pleased to debut an exclusive clip which highlights what Legrand does so well with vantage point and suspense in both his feature and the Oscar-nominated short it is based on.
Our own Jared Mobarak caught Custody in Toronto, and still names it his favorite film of 2018 thus far. In his review, he spoke highly of the film’s depth, saying, “The intensity is too much to bear in the best possible way.
Our own Jared Mobarak caught Custody in Toronto, and still names it his favorite film of 2018 thus far. In his review, he spoke highly of the film’s depth, saying, “The intensity is too much to bear in the best possible way.
- 7/1/2018
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
“Joint custody blows.” That poignant declaration, made by one of the kiddos being fought over in Noah Baumbach’s “The Squid and the Whale,” succinctly summarizes the entire custody-battle genre to which it belongs. Seven years after reaching its high-water mark with Asghar Farhadi’s “A Separation,” that genre continues with Xavier LeGrand’s “Custody.” Less nuanced than some of its predecessors but far more stressful, it isn’t an easy watch — nor is it meant to be.
It’s also Legrand’s debut feature, arriving four years after his Oscar-nominated short “Just Before Losing Everything.” The first-timer won the Silver Lion for Best Director at last year’s Venice Film Festival, and his control over the material is on clear display throughout all 93 nail-biting minutes: “Custody” begins with an air of documentary reality before evolving into a thriller so claustrophobic its climax fits inside the bathroom of a modest apartment.
It’s also Legrand’s debut feature, arriving four years after his Oscar-nominated short “Just Before Losing Everything.” The first-timer won the Silver Lion for Best Director at last year’s Venice Film Festival, and his control over the material is on clear display throughout all 93 nail-biting minutes: “Custody” begins with an air of documentary reality before evolving into a thriller so claustrophobic its climax fits inside the bathroom of a modest apartment.
- 6/29/2018
- by Michael Nordine
- Indiewire
Custody (Jusqu´à la garde) Kino Lorber Reviewed by: Harvey Karten Director: Xavier Legrand Screenwriter: Xavier Legrand Cast: Léa Drucker Denis Ménochet, Thomas Gioria, Mathilde Auneveux, Mathieu Saikaly Screened at: Dolby88, NYC, 6/12/18 Opens: June 29, 2018 In his philosophic book “The Human Predicament” author David Benatar suggests the bringing new lives into the world is […]
The post Custody Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
The post Custody Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
- 6/25/2018
- by Harvey Karten
- ShockYa
"Your children have turned against you." Kino Lorber has debuted the new Us trailer for French domestic drama Custody, about parents fighting over the custody of their children. This trailer follows the UK trailer and is a bit different, with an unsettling ticking clock noise in the background making the tension even more unbearable. Written & directed by Xavier Legrand, it's about a bitter custody battle over an embattled son in the middle of a broken marriage. Custody stars Denis Ménochet, Léa Drucker, Thomas Gioria, Mathilde Auneveux, and Florence Janas. The film received rave reviews out of Venice, described as a "steady crescendo of suspense" by The Film Stage. This plays in Us theaters starting June 29th, be on the lookout for it - it's one of the most highly rated French films arriving this year, worth seeing when it opens. Here's the official Us trailer (+ new Us poster) for Xavier Legrand's Custody,...
- 5/23/2018
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Custody, also known by its French title Jusqu’à la garde, tells the seemingly familiar story of a messy divorce, and the inherent conversation of child custody that comes along with it. However, director Xavier Legrand ups the ante by shifting the tone to be electrifying rather than simply dramatic, and this tonal augmentation can be seen clearly in the first U.S. trailer.
As far as feature-length directorial debuts go, Custody is a fantastic achievement for Legrand. The film has been selections at a wide range of film festivals including the distinguished Toronto International and Venice Film Festival (at which Legrand took home the Best Director award). Our own Jared Mobarak caught Custody in Toronto and spoke highly of the film’s depth: “The intensity is too much to bear in the best possible way. Legrand knows exactly where to position his characters and what’s necessary to break them.
As far as feature-length directorial debuts go, Custody is a fantastic achievement for Legrand. The film has been selections at a wide range of film festivals including the distinguished Toronto International and Venice Film Festival (at which Legrand took home the Best Director award). Our own Jared Mobarak caught Custody in Toronto and spoke highly of the film’s depth: “The intensity is too much to bear in the best possible way. Legrand knows exactly where to position his characters and what’s necessary to break them.
- 5/23/2018
- by The Film Stage
- The Film Stage
The shape of Xavier Legrand’s “Custody” is familiar enough — a family torn apart by a raging custody battle is forced to contend with a bad divorce, emotionally distraught children, and a pair of parents at loose ends — but Legrand takes those seemingly standard narrative lines and turns them into something wholly unexpected in his feature directorial debut. While “Custody” is certainly occupied with the fallout from a contentious breakup, Legrand also builds in the kind of tension that would be at home in a different kind of domestic thriller. This isn’t just a family drama, it’s something much more twisted (and twisting).
“Custody” is all about the gray spaces, as Miriam (Léa Drucker) and Antoine (Denis Ménochet) attempt to hammer out an agreement regarding their two young children, including son Julien (Thomas Gioria), a legal battle that reveals all kinds of messy details, the kind that don...
“Custody” is all about the gray spaces, as Miriam (Léa Drucker) and Antoine (Denis Ménochet) attempt to hammer out an agreement regarding their two young children, including son Julien (Thomas Gioria), a legal battle that reveals all kinds of messy details, the kind that don...
- 5/22/2018
- by Kate Erbland
- Indiewire
Xavier Legrand’s debut feature is a terrifying study of a father’s destructive rage
It starts in a family custody hearing, a Dardennes-style exercise in efficient naturalism. But the clipped, social-realist restraint gradually fractures into something brittle and breathless, something closer to pure horror. The blood ties are rent as thoroughly as the splintered wood of the bathroom door – the flimsy last barrier between Miriam (Léa Drucker), her 11-year-old son, Julien (Thomas Gioria), and the ferocious, relentless rage of her ex-husband, Antoine (Denis Ménochet).
And if that seems like an abrupt tonal shift, well, that’s rather the point that actor turned first-time writer-director Xavier Legrand is making. For the women in France who are killed at a rate of one every three days by their partners, banal quotidian routines can coexist with paralysing fear and violence. The effect is wrenching. For all its stripped-bare economy and unsentimentality, this...
It starts in a family custody hearing, a Dardennes-style exercise in efficient naturalism. But the clipped, social-realist restraint gradually fractures into something brittle and breathless, something closer to pure horror. The blood ties are rent as thoroughly as the splintered wood of the bathroom door – the flimsy last barrier between Miriam (Léa Drucker), her 11-year-old son, Julien (Thomas Gioria), and the ferocious, relentless rage of her ex-husband, Antoine (Denis Ménochet).
And if that seems like an abrupt tonal shift, well, that’s rather the point that actor turned first-time writer-director Xavier Legrand is making. For the women in France who are killed at a rate of one every three days by their partners, banal quotidian routines can coexist with paralysing fear and violence. The effect is wrenching. For all its stripped-bare economy and unsentimentality, this...
- 4/15/2018
- by Wendy Ide
- The Guardian - Film News
MaryAnn’s quick take… Transforms a straightforward story of domestic violence into something like a horror movie, and it’s so harrowing and so incredibly tense that I’m not sure that it’s not exploitive. I’m “biast” (pro): nothing
I’m “biast” (con): nothing
(what is this about? see my critic’s minifesto) women’s participation in this film
(learn more about this)
Idon’t know if I can take this, I wrote at one point in my notes while enduring Custody, the debut feature of French writer-director Xavier Legrand, which transforms a straightforward depiction of domestic violence into something like a horror movie. Not that what many women and children are subjected to at the hands of violent, possessive husbands and fathers isn’t horrible — it is. But what Legrand is offering us here is simply the everyday family life of too many people, and...
I’m “biast” (con): nothing
(what is this about? see my critic’s minifesto) women’s participation in this film
(learn more about this)
Idon’t know if I can take this, I wrote at one point in my notes while enduring Custody, the debut feature of French writer-director Xavier Legrand, which transforms a straightforward depiction of domestic violence into something like a horror movie. Not that what many women and children are subjected to at the hands of violent, possessive husbands and fathers isn’t horrible — it is. But what Legrand is offering us here is simply the everyday family life of too many people, and...
- 4/12/2018
- by MaryAnn Johanson
- www.flickfilosopher.com
Xavier Legrand’s intense, pressure-cooker drama on a son’s coercion by his angry, macho father certainly builds tension
There’s a unidirectional agony to this psychological drama from actor turned director Xavier Legrand – this is the much-talked-about festival prizewinner which Legrand developed from his 2013 short Avant Que De Tout Perdre, or Just Before Losing Everything. Legrand could have kept that title for his full-length feature version. It’s almost a story without a story, in that there is hardly any narrative progression as such, no phased revelation of character, no twist and counter-twist, and no point-of-view switches designed to raise queries about the truth. No: the focus is on one single horrible situation, getting steadily and unwatchably worse: a simmering pot of rage and toxic masculinity under which the gas-ring gets turned up and up. It concerns a divorce, and a legal hearing about custody.
Denis Ménochet plays Antoine,...
There’s a unidirectional agony to this psychological drama from actor turned director Xavier Legrand – this is the much-talked-about festival prizewinner which Legrand developed from his 2013 short Avant Que De Tout Perdre, or Just Before Losing Everything. Legrand could have kept that title for his full-length feature version. It’s almost a story without a story, in that there is hardly any narrative progression as such, no phased revelation of character, no twist and counter-twist, and no point-of-view switches designed to raise queries about the truth. No: the focus is on one single horrible situation, getting steadily and unwatchably worse: a simmering pot of rage and toxic masculinity under which the gas-ring gets turned up and up. It concerns a divorce, and a legal hearing about custody.
Denis Ménochet plays Antoine,...
- 4/12/2018
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
New talent Thomas Gioria plays Julien in Custody - "He understood how to act and he took on the subject well.” - director Xavier Legrand Photo: UniFrance
After garnering a reputation as a prolific stage actor as well as roles in films by such directors as Philippe Garrel, Xavier Legrand has embarked on a career as a cinema director with a hard-hitting examination of the theme of domestic violence and parental warfare: Custody (Jusqu’à La Garde), which was expanded from an original treatment in an Oscar-nominated and César winning short film.
Legrand (39) who studied drama at the National Conservatory of Paris, focuses on two parents who confront each other over the custody of their child. “Thousands of people live this situation every day,” he says. “I wanted the film to reveal the deeply buried violence and silent fear. Rather than making the separation the subject of a family or social drama,...
After garnering a reputation as a prolific stage actor as well as roles in films by such directors as Philippe Garrel, Xavier Legrand has embarked on a career as a cinema director with a hard-hitting examination of the theme of domestic violence and parental warfare: Custody (Jusqu’à La Garde), which was expanded from an original treatment in an Oscar-nominated and César winning short film.
Legrand (39) who studied drama at the National Conservatory of Paris, focuses on two parents who confront each other over the custody of their child. “Thousands of people live this situation every day,” he says. “I wanted the film to reveal the deeply buried violence and silent fear. Rather than making the separation the subject of a family or social drama,...
- 2/27/2018
- by Richard Mowe
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
"Which of you is the bigger liar?" Picturehouse UK has unveiled a trailer for the French domestic drama titled Custody, which won Best Director at last year's Venice Film Festival. Written & directed by Xavier Legrand, the film is about a bitter custody battle over an embattled son in the middle of a broken marriage. Custody stars Denis Ménochet, Léa Drucker, Thomas Gioria, Mathilde Auneveux, and Florence Janas. The film received rave reviews out of Venice, described as a "steady crescendo of suspense" by The Film Stage, and "a scintillating separation drama" by the BFI. This trailer promises an impressive, powerful film that shows just how manipulative and destructive custody battles can be, especially on the child(ren). With this and Zvyagintsev's Loveless, some of the best new films are about feuding parents and their kids. Here's the official UK trailer (+ the French poster) for Xavier Legrand's Custody, direct from YouTube: After a bitter divorce,...
- 2/5/2018
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
There are some films which aren’t necessarily the easiest watch, but leave you with a rewarding cinematic experience like none other. Make no mistake, “Custody” is hardly eating your movie vegetables. The new film by Xavier Legrand may break your heart and leave you emotionally drained, but you’ll probably also tell someone to go see it immediately afterward.
Starring Denis Ménochet, Léa Drucker and Thomas Gioria, the premise of the film is straightforward, following the custody battle between two parents for their son.
Continue reading ‘Custody’ Trailer: This Searing Venice Winner Will Break Your Heart at The Playlist.
Starring Denis Ménochet, Léa Drucker and Thomas Gioria, the premise of the film is straightforward, following the custody battle between two parents for their son.
Continue reading ‘Custody’ Trailer: This Searing Venice Winner Will Break Your Heart at The Playlist.
- 2/1/2018
- by Kevin Jagernauth
- The Playlist
When a few hundred films stop by the Toronto International Film Festival, it’s certainly impossible to cover everything, but we were able to catch around 100 features — and, with that, it’s time to conclude our experience, following the festival’s own award winners. We’ve rounded up our favorite films seen during the festival, followed by a list of the complete coverage.
Stay tuned over the next months (or years) as we bring updates on films as they make their way to screens. One can also click here for a link to all of our coverage, including news, trailers, reviews, and much more. As always, thanks for reading, and let us know what you’re most looking forward to in the comments below.
The Breadwinner (Nora Twomey)
In the Taliban-controlled Afghan city of Kabul, Nora Twomey’s debut film as sole director (she co-helmed Oscar nominee The Secret of Kells...
Stay tuned over the next months (or years) as we bring updates on films as they make their way to screens. One can also click here for a link to all of our coverage, including news, trailers, reviews, and much more. As always, thanks for reading, and let us know what you’re most looking forward to in the comments below.
The Breadwinner (Nora Twomey)
In the Taliban-controlled Afghan city of Kabul, Nora Twomey’s debut film as sole director (she co-helmed Oscar nominee The Secret of Kells...
- 9/18/2017
- by The Film Stage
- The Film Stage
It didn’t win the Oscar for best live action short in 2014, but Xavier Legrand’s Just Before Losing Everything was by far my favorite nominee. Discovering his debut feature Custody was constructed as an expansion of that story therefore made it a must-see. The short is soon revealed as a prequel, its look at the fallout of domestic abuse hopefully in the rearview considering Miriam Besson (Léa Drucker) readies to plead her case as to why her now ex-husband (Denis Ménochet’s Antoine) shouldn’t retain custody of their son Julien (Thomas Gioria)—his sister Joséphine (Mathilde Auneveux) recently turned eighteen and is free regardless. But while the evidence seems to prove Miriam’s case, a father’s love trumps a lack of concrete proof of his terror. The threat he poses, however, remains very real.
It’s a tense scene—lengthy and dialogue heavy as both parents sit alongside their lawyers.
It’s a tense scene—lengthy and dialogue heavy as both parents sit alongside their lawyers.
- 9/12/2017
- by Jared Mobarak
- The Film Stage
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