The Department of French & Italian and the International Film Series have partnered to bring in the Albertine Cinémathèque French Film Festival! Designed to expand access to French cinema and support film programming at American colleges and universities, Albertine Cinémathèque’s annual film selection engages with the greatest issues of our time while nurturing an enduring love for this diverse and evolving art form. Albertine Cinémathèque is part of the French For All initiative by Villa Albertine and Albertine Foundation and is made possible by the support of the Centre National du Cinéma et de l’Image Animée (CNC).

Films were selected for their cultural and cinematic significance and will include special introductions from University faculty. All shows are also FREE for all to attend!

MISERICORDIA Synopsis: The teasingly entwined ambiguities of love and death continue to fascinate Alain Guiraudie (Stranger by the Lake, NYFF51), who returns with a sharp, sinister, yet slyly funny thriller. Set in an autumnal, woodsy village in his native region of Occitanie, his latest follows the meandering exploits of Jérémie (Félix Kysyl), an out-of-work baker who has drifted back to his hometown after the death of his beloved former boss, a bakery owner. Staying long after the funeral, the seemingly benign Jérémie begins to casually insinuate himself into his mentor’s family, including his kind-hearted widow (Catherine Frot) and venomously angry son (Jean-Baptiste Durand), while making an increasingly surprising—and ultimately beneficial—friendship with an oddly cheerful local priest (Jacques Develay). In Guiraudie’s quietly carnal world, violence and eroticism explode with little anticipation, and criminal behavior can seem like a natural extension of physical desire. The French director is at the top of his game in Misericordia, again upending all genre expectations.