French touch in New York

Almost all of the event’s opening weekend screenings held at the Walter Reade Theater and the IFC Center played to packed houses. Both screenings of Claude Lelouch’s film Roman de Gare were sold out at the Walter Reade Theater, while a screening of A Secret by Claude Miller attracted such crowds at the IFC Center that 100 would-be patrons were turned away at the door.

Several screenings scheduled this week are already booked out through advance ticket sales. The Film Society of Lincoln Center has announced record ticket sales, which after just a few days outnumbered the total ticket sales for 2007, with the IFC Center also reporting sales well above last year’s figures.

On February 29, the French Embassy’s Cultural Affairs office hosted a party for over 250 guests to celebrate the opening of the Rendez-Vous.
Distributors present included Dylan Leiner from Sony Pictures Classics, Rebeca Conget and Meghan Wurtz from Film Movement, Arianna Bocco and Ryan Werner from IFC Films, Gary Palmucci from Kino International, Richard Lorber and Suzanne Fedak from Koch Lorber Films, Eamonn Bowles and the team from Magnolia Pictures, Rob Williams from Netflix, Ben Stambler from Thinkfilm, and Nancy Gerstman from Zeitgeist Films.

Three films landed acquisition deals during the event’s opening weekend: A Secret was sold to Strand Releasing, The Grocer’s Son was sold to Film Movement, and Fear(s) of the Dark was sold to IFC, adding to a list of four films pre-sold (Love Songs, Her Name is Sabine, The Heartbeat Detector (aka The Human Question), and Roman de Gare).

A recent article in the New York Times sings the praises of the event, complimenting the high quality of this year’s program, thus adding to the already enthusiastic welcome offered to this Rendez-Vous held one week after the 2008 Academy Awards, at which French films claimed their share of the spotlight.