Early Short Films of the French New Wave
All restored!
Starting in the mid-1950s, a group of talented young filmmakers presented a radically new vision of French cinema. Dubbed the “Young Turks” by Cahiers du Cinéma co-founder André Bazin, they overturned the studio-based industry of the day, creating films that were modern, political... and funny. The group included François Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, Agnès Varda, Éric Rohmer, and more.
Produced between 1957 and 1965, these shorts are not just stepping stones on the way to the famed New Wave features, but classics that stand on their own. These films are the first forays of a movement that would revolutionize the world of French film and influence cinema around the world for decades to come.
-
The Little Cafe
Directed by François Reichenbach • Documentary • 1963 • 12 minutes
A slice-of-life film shot in a provincial cafe and hotel in the city of Bethune in the department of Pas-de-Calais, in Northern France. Older men smoke, drink beer and read the paper, young lovers gaze into each other’s eyes, and...
-
Paris, a Winter's Day
Directed by Guy Gilles • Documentary • 1962 • 10 minutes
This is a love letter to living in Paris — even on a bitterly cold winter’s day. Interspersed with shots of the city, we hear from Parisians, including a group of boys on the joys of pelting passers-by with snowballs, and a 73-year-old who...
-
The Botanical Avatar of Mademoiselle Flora
Directed by Jeanne Barbillon • Drama • With Bernadette Lafont, Louis Mesuret • 1965 • 15 minutes
In a small French town, Flora (Bernadette Lafont) has a six-week fling with a soldier. But this is no passionate affair. Her lover, the cartoonish Charles (Louis Mesuret), ignores her advances, insis...
-
All the World's Memory
Directed by Alain Resnais • Documentary • 1956 • 21 minutes
This recently restored early short by French New Wave director Alain Resnais (perhaps best known for Hiroshima Mon Amour), pays homage to the National Library of France. For centuries, the library has served as a repository for all the ...
-
Fool's Mate (Le Coup du Berger)
Directed by Jacques Rivette • Drama • With Virginie Vitry, Jean-Claude Brialy, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze • 1957 • 27 minutes
An early film from the six-decade career of hugely influential French director and critic Jacques Rivette.
Claire (Virginie Vitry) is given a gorgeous fur coat by her lover...
-
The Goumbé of the Young Revelers
Directed by Jean Rouch • Documentary • 1965 • 28 minutes
As West African cities faced explosive growth in the 1960s, young people found themselves displaced, living in urban centers far from their families and home regions.
Enter the goumbés—youth associations combining networking, mutual aid, ...
-
Ô saisons ô châteaux
Directed by Agnès Varda • Documentary • With Danièle Delorme • 1956 • 21 minutes
This early Agnès Varda short looks at the castles of the Loire Valley — and the unusual histories and personalities behind them. Punctuated by first-person accounts, excerpts from well-known poems, and stylish re-cr...
-
Six In Paris
7 items
Directed by Claude Chabrol, Jean Douchet, Jean-Luc Godard, Jean-Daniel Pollet, Eric Rohmer and Jean Rouch • Documentary • 1965 • 96 minutes
In 1965, young producer Barbet Schroeder supplied a 16mm camera, along with color film stock, to six friends, asking them to each make a short film about a ...
-
Charlotte and Her Boyfriend
Directed by Jean-Luc Godard • Drama • 1958 • 13 minutes
“Let me finish,” Jules (Jean-Paul Belmondo, voiced by Jean-Luc Godard) repeatedly tells his ex Charlotte (Anne Colette) without ever pausing long enough for her to actually say anything. When Charlotte appears in his apartment eating an ice...
-
All the Boys Are Called Patrick
Directed by Jean-Luc Godard • Drama • 1957 • 12 minutes
In ALL THE BOYS ARE CALLED PATRICK, Charlotte (Anne Colette) and Véronique (Nicole Berger) are roommates who share a tiny flat with a single bed. Charlotte’s taste in books ranges from Hegel to The Fate of the Immodest Blonde, while Véroniq...
-
A Story of Water
Directed by Jean-Luc Godard and François Truffaut • Drama • 1958 • 12 minutes
As the spring melt floods the streets of a town outside Paris, a student (Caroline Dim) faces one obstacle after another while trying to get to the Sorbonne. Eventually, she meets up with a dashing young driver (Jean-C...
-
The Song of Styrene (Le chant du styrène)
Directed by Alain Resnais • Documentary • 1957 • 13 minutes
Recently restored and digitized in 2K!
THE SONG OF STYRENE is the perfect example of how to turn a commissioned industrial film into a lyrical, satirical film masterpiece. When the young Alain Resnais was asked by the Péchiney plastics...
-
500 Francs
Directed by Melvin Van Peebles • Drama • 1961 • 12 minutes
Set to a percussive, syncopated soundtrack, this early Melvin Van Peebles short is a small-scale tale of obsession, greed and violence. In a run-down neighborhood, a boy notices a 500-franc note in a sewer. His improvised efforts to pull...
-
Janine
Directed by Maurice Pialat • Drama • 2023 • 17 minutes
During a desultory night on the town—playing pool, buying the paper, eating fries—two men talk about their experiences with women. One of them (Hubert Deschamps) disparages his ex-wife, “the queen of whores,” who he admits to beating with hi...
-
The Fifteen Year Old Widows
Directed by Jean Rouch • Drama • 2023 • 25 minutes
“When I’m old, at 25, I’ll get married and that will be the end.” —Véronique
In this short, Jean Rouch turns his anthropological eye to bourgeois teenage girls in Paris, in the summer of 1964. Caught in the in-between world of adolescence (the...
-
Love Exists
Directed by Maurice Pialat • Documentary • 1961 • 19 minutes
Maurice Pialat may have grown up in the suburbs, but he has little love for them. In this poetic but critical essay, he turns his gaze to a range of post-war Paris suburbs: From the bourgeois plots of land where the “little” aesthetic ...
-
The Overworked
Directed by Jacques Doniol-Valcroze • Drama • 1957 • 25 minutes
A morality tale about the dangers of modern urban life. Catherine (Yane Barry), a champion young typist from small-town France, heads to Paris to be with her fiancé (Jean-Pierre Cassel) — who also happens to be her new boss. Living ...
-
The Marines
Directed by François Reichenbach • Documentary • 1957 • 21 minutes
François Reichenbach follows a group of young men from the day they enlist in the US Marine Corps, all the way through basic training. The power of this is twofold. It lies in the poetic visuals focused on the men’s faces and exp...
-
In Memory of Rock
Directed by François Reichenbach • Documentary • With Johnny Hallyday, Les Chaussettes Noires • 1963 • 11 minutes
IN MEMORY OF ROCK captures the power, promise, and fear generated by the early days of rock n’roll. It is also a fascinating study in the juxtaposition of image and music. Outside an...
-
Van Gogh
Directed by Alain Resnais • Documentary • 1948 • 18 minutes
Classic French New Wave director Alain Resnais’ early film, VAN GOGH won an Oscar for best short documentary film. Recently restored, this 1948 boundary-pushing short brilliantly evokes the life of Vincent Van Gogh, using only his paint...
-
Paul Gauguin
Directed by Alain Resnais • Documentary • 1949 • 13 minutes
PAUL GAUGUIN uses the artist’s own writings and artwork to trace his creative journey. The film begins with Gauguin losing his job in finance—the catalyst for his commitment to paint every day—and continues through to his final days in ...
-
Directing Actors by Jean Renoir
Directed by Gisèle Braunberger • Documentary • 1968 • 22 minutes
Actor Gisèle Braunberger sits across a small table from Jean Renoir. She leans forward, focusing intently on the director, her hands rhythmically fidgeting, as he outlines the premise of the script page he is about to work through ...
-
Guernica
Directed by Alain Resnais and Robert Hessens • Documentary • 1949 • 14 minutes
In 1937, Spanish nationalists called on Nazi and Italian Fascist forces to bomb the Basque town of Guernica. The horrors of the bombing led Pablo Picasso to create perhaps his greatest work, “Guernica”: a massive pain...