Special Guest: Ginette Vincendeau Guest Co-Hosts: Judith Mayne, Lumi Etienne
Tension simmers and explodes in La Haine (1995), Matthieu Kassovitz’s electrifying portrait of disenfranchised youth in the Parisian banlieues. Mike is joined by guest co-hosts Lumi Etienne and Judith Mayne for a deep dive into the film’s kinetic black-and-white visuals, pulsing energy, and unflinching look at police violence, social unrest, and systemic alienation.
Set over a volatile 24-hour span, the story follows three friends -- Vinz, Saïd, and Hubert (Vincent Cassel, Saïd Taghmaoui, and Hubert Koundé) -- as they struggle to navigate a world marked by brutality, disillusionment, and rage.
Special guest Ginette Vincendeau, one of the foremost scholars of French cinema, brings essential context to the conversation, examining La Haine’s place in postcolonial French film, its socio-political impact, and its enduring relevance in the global discourse on race, power, and resistance.
Special Guest: Ginette Vincendeau Guest Co-Hosts: Samm Deighan, Andrew Leavold
Film historian Samm Deighan and cult cinema expert Andrew Leavold join Mike to shine a light on Jean-Pierre Melville's Two Men in Manhattan (1959). Often overshadowed by his better-known crime films, this moody noir follows a journalist and a photographer as they comb the streets of New York in search of a missing French diplomat. The trio digs into Melville’s fascination with American style, the film’s ethically murky characters, and how it fits within the director’s larger body of work. They also explore the tension between documentary realism and stylized noir, and why Two Men in Manhattan deserves a second look.
Special Guest: Ginette Vincendeau Guest Co-Hosts: Samm Deighan, Andrew Leavold
We conclude Art House August with a look at Jean-Pierre Melville's Army of Shadows (1969). Based loosely on Joseph Kessel's memoir about the French Resistance in World War II, the film stars Lino Ventura as Phillipe Gerbier, one of a handful of Resistance fighters we meet as we travel through the underworld, striking out at the German occupiers and those loyal to the Vichy government.
Special Guest: Ginette Vincendeau Guest Co-Hosts: Samm Deighan, Andrew Leavold
French Month continues with a look at Jean-Pierre Melville’s Bob le Flambeur (1956), the first of many gangster films he would direct. Based on his story with dialogue by Auguste LeBreton, it tells the tale of Bob (Roger Duchesne), an aging man who robbed a bank 20 years prior, and now spends his time going from game to game -- craps, cards, whatever. He even has a slot machine in his Montmartre apartment.
Special Guest: Ginette Vincendeau
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