The Rules of the Game
This recurring cycle is an opportunity to watch or re-watch classics from cinema history, or films representative of certain national cinematographies, trends or eras, on the big screen.
High society figures gathered for a hunting party suddenly reveal their true colors: whether bourgeois or servants, they all play the same game, where lying is the rule. Burlesque and poetry, tenderness and cruelty, humor and pathos come together in this masterpiece by Renoir.
Jean Renoir
The second son of the famous painter Auguste Renoir, his films had a profound impact on the mutations of French cinema between 1930 and 1950, paving the way for the French New Wave. Jean Renoir was one of the first filmmakers to be known as an auteur. After serving in the army during World War I, he directed his wife and older brother in his first film, The Whirlpool of Fate (La fille de l'eau), in 1924. The film wasn't a success, but the young Jean, passionate about cinema, did not give up. His career really took off with La chienne in 1931. La grande illusion, starring Jean Gabin, and The Rules of the Game (La règle du jeu) are now considered major masterpieces of world cinema. In the early 1940s, as war was declared, he moved to Hollywood, where he made several films such as This Land Is Mine, The Southerner, and The Diary of a Chambermaid. He returned to France in the early 1950s, directing several masterpieces like The Golden Coach (Le carrosse d'or) and French Cancan. In 1962, he made his last film for cinema. In 1975, he received an Honorary Academy Award for his career achievements, before passing away four years later.
