French film festival convenes Oscar hopefuls in Los Angeles

Five films hoping for nods in the international film category are screening at the American French Film Festival in Los Angeles, which kicks off Tuesday.

The American celebration of Francophone cinema -- which is marking its 30th anniversary in Hollywood -- this year includes the French entry "Minotaur," a film from the exiled Russian director Andrey Zvyagintsev along with four films co-produced by France.

Romania's submission to the Academy -- "Fjord," starring Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve -- is featured, along with the Belgian film "Coward," set during World War I and directed by Lukas Dhont.

Japan's entry "All of a Sudden" directed by Ryuske Hamaguchi and "Strawberries" representing Morocco are also heavy hitters on the line-up.

"Filmmakers from everywhere are choosing France as the place to make their work," said Anouchka van Riel, deputy director of the festival known as TAFFF, told AFP.

"This year's program tells the story for us."

The festival opens Tuesday with the premiere of "In Waves," which centers on the California surf scene and is Netflix-bound.

Also debuting this week is the epic "De Gaulle," a two-part production by director Antonin Baudry that chronicles the political, military and personal challenges the French general faced during World War II.

"This is an almost unique example in modern history of a very loyal civil servant rebelling against his own government because his government is immoral," said Baudry, who also co-wrote the screenplay.

"He was seen like a fool. Now everybody thinks he was wise," the filmmaker told AFP.

Baudry said that while the story could resonate at any time, "it's comforting today to see how a lonesome man inspired people to hope before they had reasons to hope, to fight before they had weapons to fight."

Art 'that gets you through'

The Academy is set to announce its shortlist for the best international feature film Oscar in December.

TAFFF, traditionally held one month earlier, has sought to position itself as a launchpad for French-language contenders.

The war drama "Coward" starring Emmanuel Macchia and Valentin Campagne -- who shared the best actor award at Cannes -- arrives at TAFFF following a successful run on the festival circuit.

Dhont, who also co-wrote the screenplay, drew inspiration from photographs of WWI soldiers in the trenches who turned to theater amid the conflict.

"For me that idea of creation in the midst of so much destruction was such a hopeful and inspiring thing," Dhont told AFP.

"These men, traumatized, were actually moving to this more hopeful place," he continued, saying the soldiers "were actually liberating themselves from the archetype of the soldier and just, you know, playing women, dancing on a stage, making music."

Dhont described his film as being about "the place of art as the thing that gets you through."

He said he views film festivals as the ideal setting for such a story, saying they "are so much about art as an act of resisting the violence of the world."

In the non-fiction category, TAFFF will also present "Inside Gaza" -- a documentary that followed a team of AFP journalists trapped and working in the Palestinian territory during the initial months of the Israeli offensive that followed the October 7, 2023 attack by Hamas.

TAFFF concludes on November 8.