Full programme
2024
Opening and closing night films
International Fantastic Film Competition
Crossovers Competition
International Animated Film Competition
Midnight Movies
Special Screenings
Ozploitation!
In 1970, government incentives, designed to boost Australia’s moribund film industry, gave rise to two extraordinarily creative movements, the Australian New Wave and a rash of exploitation films known as Ozploitation. From 1970 to 1995, both produced a variety of bold films, with striking visuals and a distinct Australian identity. If Ozploitation abounds in the hyperbolic, combining horror, fights, booze, sex and ubiquitous explosions – Next of Kin and The Man from Hong Kong, other films – Jimmie Blacksmith, Long Weekend and the brutal Wake in Fright – take aim at Australian society, bluntly indicting colonialism, racism, the destruction of nature and the cults of virile masculinity.
Australia’s outback, a powerful conveyor of emotions, plays a pivotal role in the New Wave masterpieces, Picnic at Hanging Rock and Walkabout. Its presence casts an indecipherable influence over their narratives, tilting them into an otherworldliness that borders on the supernatural.
Enjoy the 11 films in the selection, some of which them are rarities. Barring a few exceptions, Oz cinema has sadly never found wide-release in France.
Eccentric Night
If you like continuity errors, corny dubbing and defiantly clumsy direction, this is the evening for you. The esteemed Cinémathèque française has once again curated a programme to keep you awake until the wee hours with a post-apocalyptic Italian film breathlessly riding the wave of the successful Mad Max; a naughty Bavarian comedy to honour our Rhineland culture; and a Japanese monster movie with an ersatz Godzilla, looking like Casimir after a road accident. All, of course, on 35mm film, dubiously dubbed in French, and extracted from the vaults of the Cinémathèque. As a bonus, two programmes of eye-catching and ear-popping trailers. Breakfast will be served at dawn to help all brave souls still awake recover from their ordeal.
