The Crimson Curtain (1953)

Aissa, a young officer of Algerian origin, tragically loses his life during a fresher initiation ritual at the prestigious French military academy of Saint-Cyr. As the death tears through his family, controversy arises over Aissa’s funeral plans when the Army refuses to take responsibility. Ismael, his older, rebellious brother, tries to keep the family united as they fight to win justice for Aissa.

Raf and Julie, a couple on the verge of breaking up, find themselves in an emergency ward bordering on collapse on the evening of a Parisian Yellow Vest protest. Their encounter with Yann, an angry and injured demonstrator, will shatter each person's certainties and prejudices. Outside, the tension escalates.

Mélanie, 16 years old, lives with her mother. She likes going to school, her friends, playing the cello, and she wants to change the world. But when she meets a boy on the Internet and falls in love with him, her world changes as she is gradually recruited by Daesh. Sonia is 17 years old, and she almost did something irrevocable to “guarantee” her family a place in paradise. These teenage girls might be called Anaïs, Manon or Leila, and one day they all might go some way down the recruitment process. But can they ever come back from it?

Esther is at the end of her career as Head Seamstress at Dior Avenue Montaigne workshop. One day, she gets her handbag stolen in the metro by a 20 years old girl, Jade. Instead of calling the police she decides to take care of Jade. She sees in her the opportunity to pass on her skills, the craft of dressmaking, her only wealth. In the frenetic world of Haute Couture, Esther will give Jade la beauté du geste, a way to reach beyond herself.

A star is born in a time of both celebration and instability in this historical drama with music from director Christophe Barratier. In the spring of 1936, Paris is in a state of uncertainty; while the rise of the Third Reich in Germany worries many, a leftist union-oriented candidate, Léon Blum, has been voted into power, and organized labor is feeling its new power by standing up to management.

A bourgeois couple, modern yet conventional. One night by accident, a young prostitute barges into their lives. Hounded down, beaten up, threatened, she will continue to struggle, with the help of a well off lady, first for her survival-her resurrection-then for her dignity and freedom. Stormy encounters for everyone involved.

In 1953, a sensitive French boy finds out from a neighbor that his family's Jewish. François Grimbert becomes a physician, and gradually peels the layers of his buried family history which resulted in his difficult upbringing, raised as Catholic by his "Aryan" appearing parents. His athletic father labored to stamp out stereotypical Jewish characteristics he perceived in his son, to keep the family's many secrets, as most relatives fought in World War II, and later were hauled off to labor and death camps by the Gestapo.

The comfortable daily routines of aging Parisian actor Gilbert Valence, 76, are suddenly shaken when he learns that his wife, daughter, and son-in-law have been killed in a car crash. Having to take care of his now-orphaned grandson, he struggles to go on with his lifelong acting career like he's used to. But the roles he is offered -- a flashy TV show and a hectic last-minute replacement in an English-language film of Joyce's Ulysses -- finally convince him that it's time to retire.

Jean and Otto, a French newspaperman and a young German Francophile, are fighting for peace in Europe. Jean’s daughter, Corinne, is launching a brilliant acting career in the film world, but war breaks out and France is occupied. The two friends have a major role to play in this new France. Jean becomes a big press baron and an ardent advocate of collaboration with the occupying forces, while Otto becomes the Reich’s ambassador in Paris. Corinne, meanwhile, finds herself thrown into the lion’s pit.

After the lewd and frenetic Dance of the Seven Veils, and with the solemn pledge from the very lips of Herod himself that she could have whatever her heart desires up to half his kingdom, wanton and proud young Salomé comes before her king with an unreasonable demand. Beguiled by John the Baptist, and then scorned for the sake of his god, lascivious Salomé—encouraged by her mother, the vindictive, Herodias—commands that John be executed and his head delivered on a silver platter.