For the eighth year running, Unifrance and the French Embassy are to host the French Film Festival in Russia this year.
After events held at Nijni-Novgorod and Novossibirsk in 2006, this year’s French Film Festival will take place on the European side of the territory, in Kaliningrad and Rostov-on-Don, from December 3 through 10, 2007.
This will mark the third year that this festival has traveled to provincial cities. It has become of key importance to take into account the increasing role played by provincial cities in the Russian theatrical market, with Moscow and St. Petersburg now only providing one third of movie admissions.
The 7 French films selected are as follows: Azur and Asmar by Michel Ocelot, L'Auberge Rouge (The Red Inn) by Gérard Krawczyk, Hunting and Gathering by Claude Berri, My Best Friend by Patrice Leconte, Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud, The Price to Pay by Alexandra Leclère, and Une Vieille Maîtresse (The Last Mistress) by Catherine Breillat.
A delegation of crew members from these films will be in attendance in the two Russian cities, accompanied by representatives from Unifrance, the French Foreign Affairs Ministry, and the French Embassy in Russia, where they will also meet with journalists from Moscow.
Among successful French titles this year in Russia, the smash hit Taxi 4 stands out, with 2.6 million spectators registered since its release (on 500 prints). This is the best performance by a French-language film since perestroika!
Results for the 37 French films released so far in 2007 confirm the current infatuation for French fare, with high-scoring titles including Arthur et les Minimoys (460,000 admissions), Hellphone (310,000 admissions), Priceless (250,000 admissions), I Do: How to Get Married and Stay Single (160,000 admissions), and Tell No One (110,000 admissions), followed by Angel and Paris, je t'aime, both of which are coming close to tallying 100,000 admissions.
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