Alex Descas

Adam's Sake (2025)

A head nurse defies hospital rules to let a mother stay with her malnourished son. As they navigate a complex crisis, the nurse's empathy proves just as vital to the boy's healing as medicine. ...

Kenya - Gardiennes des éléphants (2024)

In the Namunyak Wildlife Conservancy in Kenya drought is a menace to both humans and animals. This documentary follows two Elephant Guardians in their tireless work to protect this endangered species. ...

Which Way Africa? (2024)

Forest dwellers pound drums upholding rituals while urbanites cry "Progress!" More plunder the land's riches but newly defiant ones shout back. ...

Brûlé neige (2022)

Frantz Fanon, trajectoire d'un révolté (2021)

Frantz Fanon alone embodies all the issues of French colonial history. Martinican resistance fighter, he enlisted, like millions of colonial soldiers, in the Free Army out of loyalty to France and the idea of freedom that it embodies for him. A writer, he ...

Sing Me Back Home (2019)

After scuttling her career as a singer, Jewell Stone lives in Paris a job as a waitress. Marie, her grandmother and only family, who lives in Vermont, USA, arrives overnight to see her. But how to welcome her when Jewell tells her so long about her life, h ...

Maya (2018)

The film follows a 30-year-old man named Gabriel, a French war reporter who was taken to hostage in Syria and then heads to India after months in captivity. ...

Volontaire (2018)

The story revolves around 22-year-old Laure, who is trying to find her feet. After performing brilliantly in her literature studies, she enrols as a communications officer in the Naval Fusiliers. She will quickly have to adapt to and assimilate the rules t ...

Let the Sunshine In (2017)

Isabelle, Parisian artist, divorced mother, is looking for love, true love, at last. ...

Metropole (2017)

Having arrived in Paris in 1985, Hector did everything to be like "them". In a notebook he finds in his flat, he crosses out a list of things he should do or pay attention to if he wants to become part of the French elite. In a painful dialogue with Martin ...

Chocolat (2016)

Chocolat the clown, the first black stage performer in France, goes from anonymity to fame after forming an unprecedented duo with fellow performer Footit in the very popular in Belle Epoque Paris. But easy money, gambling, and discrimination take their to ...

Rouge (2015)

A companion to the director's Le Dos Rouge/Portrait of the Artist. A famous filmmaker works on his next film, which will focus on monstrosity. He is obsessed by the idea of finding a painting that will be central to the film and will crystallize all the p ...

Portrait of the Artist (2015)

A famous filmmaker works on his next film, which will focus on monstrosity. He is obsessed by the idea of finding a painting that will be central to the film and will crystallize all the power and beauty of monsters. But what he doesn't show to anyone, not ...

Madeleine d'entre les Morts (2014)

In Madeleine Among the Dead, Bonello wanted to tell Hitchcock's Vertigo from the perspective of Madeleine (played by Kim Novak), not Scottie (James Stewart). He only filmed a scene of this project as part of another film by Antoine Barraud, Le Dos Rouge, i ...

Voilà l'enchaînement (2014)

With two actors and no sets, master filmmaker Claire Denis traces the arc of a strained relationship, with a focus on race and language. In this fraught arena, words omitted can be as potentially devastating as words used, and what is not seen can have gre ...

Murder in Pacot (2014)

In the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake, a middle-aged Port-au-Prince couple come face to face with the stark contradictions of Haitian society when they are forced to rent out their villa to a foreign aid worker and his enterprising local girlfriend. ...

Un enfant en danger (2013)

Rebecca is a cop in the Juvenile Division. One day, Mathieu Francoeur comes to the station, saying his son, Joachim, has been kidnapped by his mother Christelle, with whom he's separated. However Rebecca had seven years earlier witnessed the man being extr ...

Bastards (2013)

Marco returns to Paris after his brother-in-law's suicide, where he targets the man his sister believes caused the tragedy – though he is ill-prepared for her secrets as they quickly muddy the waters. ...

Césaire, le prix de la liberté (2013)

Rapt (2009)

A rich industrialist is brutally kidnapped. While he physically and mentally degenerates in imprisonment, the kidnappers, police and the board of the company of which he is director negotiate about the ransom of 50 million euro. ...

Persecution (2009)

A solitary man and his partner share a tense love/hate relationship. Their lives are disrupted when a stranger enters, gradually insinuating himself into their world. The stranger's persistence creates strain, leaving the man with lingering questions about ...

The Limits of Control (2009)

A mysterious stranger works outside the law and keeps his objectives hidden, trusting no one. While his demeanor is paradoxically focused and dreamlike all at once, he embarks on a journey that not only takes him across Spain, but also through his own cons ...

35 Shots of Rum (2009)

A widower and his daughter witness the retirement of a colleague of his and the closing of her department at her university. ...

Négropolitain (2008)

Carl is about to spend his first day with the police. To facilitate his entry into the trade, the divisional commissioner assigned him with Alain, a man with a strong character. ...

We Don't Choose Our Parents (2008)

Following their mother's suicide, three children are the subject of a dispute between their gay half-brother and his infertile sister, who are fighting for custody. ...

Déjà vu (2007)

Boarding Gate (2007)

A beautiful woman, Sandra, seduces a wealthy businessman, Miles Rennburg. Little does he realise that she has been sent to kill him at the behest of her boyfriend/crime partner, Lester. Controlling all this is Sue, Lester's wife. ...

Tag! (2007)

"Tag!" - About the American malaria researcher Nkruma who arrives with a family to Gothenburg for a lecture at Sahlgrenska Hospital. Nkruma ends up in a strange prank. The adults play tag in the streets. Nkruma refuses to participate in the game. This will ...

The Elf Case (2007)

In 1988, after much cunning political maneuvering, Loïk Le Floch-Prigent and Alfred Sirven become the chief executives at Elf. They discover a company that runs on kickbacks: in exchange for the oil rights, Elf makes handsome but discreet payoffs to the l ...

Elf, Kings of Oil (2007)

In 1988, supported by François Mitterrand, Loïk Le Floch-Prigent ran for the presidency of Elf. Alfred Sirven, through Christine Deviers-Joncour, introduced him to Roland Dumas. A year later, Le Floch-Prigent was appointed CEO of Elf Aquitaine. Sirven be ...

A Perfect Couple (2006)

A French couple has been living in Lisbon for years, and they return to Paris for a friend's wedding. They announce to another friend they are having dinner with that they are going to split. ...

In Your Dreams (2005)

Ninth is a promising young rapper whose reputation does not exceed even the few streets of his neighborhood. With his band and supported by Keuj, hairdresser apprentice producer, he tries to attend concerts and trying to break into the music, to the chagri ...

The United States of Albert (2005)

Albert Renaud, a young French Canadian dreams of becoming a movie star and take the train to Hollywood. His trip is filled with adventures. ...

Nèg maron (2005)

Two childhood friends, Joshua and Flint, are adrift in boredom in their area of Sainte-Rose, Guadeloupe. They're involved in petty theft and ordinary System D, until the arrival of Marcus. Caught in a spiral, the difficult choices has to be done... ...

The Man Who Came From Elsewhere (2004)

At the end of 19th century, Doctor Pierre Adélaïde, born in Martinique, gets to a small village in Charente to take over from a colleague. Soon, he is facing something else than racism: fear of foreigner. His office is desperately empty. ...

Nord-plage (2004)

Portrait of Nord-Plage, a small neighborhood in the north of Martinique, which is slowly dying, and its last inhabitants, who have put aside their hopes and dreams. ...

Coffee and Cigarettes (2004)

An anthology of eleven vignettes featuring star-studded casts of extremely unique individuals who all share the common activities of conversing while drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes. ...

La nuit sera longue (2003)

It is the story of a prohibited and perverted identification: how an eight-year-old boy, entrusted to the care of his mother since the separation of the parents, meets and looks at his father, all day long. ...

Tiresia (2003)

Based on the legend of Tiresias, it tells of a transgender woman who is kidnapped by a man and left to die in the woods. She is then saved by a family and receives the gift of telling the future. ...

The Dope (2003)

Alphonse Brown, who firmly believes he is the bastard son of James Brown, meets up with his best friend Scotch after Brown gets out of jail. On their way to Paris to begin careers as recording artists, the pair stumbles across a potent type of marijuana th ...

Ten Minutes Older: The Cello (2002)

Collection of short films the summaries of which include; a foreign man moving to Italy, getting married and having a child; a four split scene short involving plot-less images of old people with television sets for heads, a beautiful woman having sex, and ...

Vers Nancy (2002)

A train conversation between an immigrant French woman and novelist Jean-Luc Nancy centering on the idea of intrusion within every foreigner (a more philosophical precursor to L'Intrus). A social commentary on the inherent fallacy - particularly in nations ...

La merveilleuse odyssée de l'idiot Toboggan (2002)

This program of short films by Vincent Ravalec (Never twice, Le Masseur and Les Mots de l'amour) deals with themes such as desire and death through the journey of a group of characters. ...

Trouble Every Day (2001)

Newlyweds Shane and June arrive in Paris for their honeymoon. In the process of trying to find a cure for his strange, bloodthirsty disease, Shane stumbles upon the story of a doctor and his flesh eating wife. ...

Lumumba (2000)

The true story of the rise to power and brutal assassination of the formerly vilified and later redeemed leader of the independent Congo, Patrice Lumumba. Using newly discovered historical evidence, Haitian-born and later Congo-raised writer and director R ...

Last Harem (1999)

On the eve of the fall of the Ottoman Empire: in the harem of Sultan Abdulhamit II, the odalisque of Italian origin Safiyè dreams of becoming the sultan's first mistress. To achieve her goal, the girl, aided by the eunuch Nadir, is even willing to kill. B ...

Late August, Early September (1999)

A book editor juggles relationships with two women while coping with his best friend's terminal illness. ...

Le serpent a mangé la grenouille (1998)

Yves Le Guen, a black man with a degree in economics, is hired as a handyman on the property of Mr. Moreau, a rich public works contractor. His arrival is going to upset the daily life of the inhabitants of the house. ...

In a Memory of a Film Gone By (1998)

A film about the creation of director Šarūnas Bartas's feature film and the mysterious atmosphere of the filming location. ...

The House (1997)

A moving world of spirits and ghosts, condemned to brush against one another without really meeting since they have all emerged from a single perpetual dream: that of a young man who no longer wants to wake up, immersed as he is in this world of fascinatin ...

Nenette and Boni (1997)

Teenage siblings Nenette and Boni were raised apart as a result of their parents' divorce. Their mother, who doted on her son Boni, has died. He works for an interesting couple as a pizza baker, and is surprised and enraged when his younger sister, having ...

My Family's Honour (1997)

In the nightclub where she works, Carole is dreaming. She has always dreamed of leaving her rainy Roubaix, her heavy guys and her lousy prospects. She is dreaming of Goa, India, where she thinks she will soon move with her friend Nora... She is dreaming ab ...

Africa Dreaming (1997)

A series of six dramatic shorts, each from a different African country and all on the broad theme of "love in Africa. ...

So Be It (1997)

Based on a play by Wole Soyinka, The Strong Breed, SO BE IT offers an emotionally searing allegory of present-day Africa's bloody internecine convulsions. ...

Irma Vep (1996)

A has-been French filmmaker wants a Hong Kong actress to be the heroine in a rendering of Les Vampires. ...

Clubbed to Death (1996)

A young woman visiting Paris, misses the last bus home, finds herself stranded on the outskirts of Paris. Entering a local club, she meets a troubled drug addict. ...

Un si joli bouquet (1995)

A young investigative journalist is about to publish a book with revelations about power and corruption. Three days before her television appearance, her apartment is devastated by an explosion. Forced into exile, she goes to the countryside where she meet ...

The Great White of Lambarene (1995)

Albert Schweitzer (1875-1965), the mission doctor, theologian and philosopher who founded a hospital in the rainforests of Gabon, achieved sainthood in his lifetime, at least in the popular imagination. The critical assessment of his life and works in rece ...

The Heart's Cry (1995)

This drama focuses upon the psychological adjustment problems of a young boy whose family moves him from Africa to Paris, France. Moctar, a boy whose first 11 years were spent in a small village in Mali, is having difficulty adjusting to his new life in Pa ...

Duo (1995)

One of a series of short films inspired by paintings. In this video, Jacques de Loustal's Le Contemplatif or "Duo". ...

The Masturbators (1995)

Images of the Port Dauphine subway terminus are accompanied by a text read aloud about masturbation (branler is slang for jacking off) in this short subject. ...

Never Twice (1995)

After much hesitation, a gigolo decides to take a shot of a radical remedy to save his failing virility. ...

I Can't Sleep (1994)

Ninon is a spirited hotel-manager who teaches self-defense classes to her terrified eldery neighbors. Daiga, an aspiring Lithuanian actress newly arrived to Paris, becomes fascinated with the life of a mysteriously beautiful drag performer. ...

The Absence (1993)

Four nameless people -- the old man, the woman, the soldier, and the gambler -- journey to a desolate wasteland beyond the limits of an unnamed city. ...

Lest We Forget (1991)

A compilation of 30 French filmmakers, Alain Resnais and Jean Luc Godard among them, who use film to make a plea on behalf of a political prisoner. Jean Luc Godard and Anne Marie Mieville's film concerns the plight of Thomas Wanggai, West Papuan activist w ...

No Fear, No Die (1990)

Dah and Jocelyn come from former French colonies to coach their rooster, "S'en fout la mort", for an illicit cock-fight in the basement of a restaurant. ...

How Good the Whites Are (1988)

The humanitarian aid expedition "Angeles Azules" (Blue Angels), comprising twelve Europeans and six trucks loaded with provisions to alleviate hunger in Sub-Saharan Africa, advances across the continent. As a result of the difficulties the team encounters, ...

Taxi Boy (1986)

The meeting of Manuel, a lady's dancer, Petrus, an unfortunate gambler, and Corinne, a fast-food waitress. The drifting of three drop-outs, three solitary dreamers, adventurous waverers. ...

Urgence (1985)

When a neo-Nazi group of terrorists is set to blow a pop concert off the face of the earth because it is an anti-racist benefit, they are faced with the intrepid Jean-Pierre Mougin, a macho sports reporter with zero tolerance for Nazi hate crimes. Going al ...

The Syringe (1984)

Good dope is becoming rare in the North of Paris. Drugstores are being raided by junkies and gangs are nervous, fighting each others: the 'Viets', the 'Blackies', the 'Arabs', the neo-nazis 'Justiciers' and some mean gays. Vincent (Daniel Auteuil) is the ...