In theaters now from Cohen Media, Les Cowboys is the directorial debut of acclaimed French screenwriter Thomas Bidegain, best known in recent years for his collaborations with French director Jacques Audiard. (He has co-scripted all of Audiard’s films following The Beat My Heart Skipped.) In an age when the value of the cinematic medium is being challenged, Bidegain has made a haunting and bold first feature that is both intimate as well as epic in scope. It’s a film steeped in the history of cinema, drawing both visual and narrative inspiration from classic American westerns. At the same time, Les […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 5, 2016In the ’90s, French screenwriter and now director Thomas Bidegain was a familiar face in the L.A. and New York film communities. He worked in distribution in L.A. for Connoisseur Films, produced independent films out of New York, and worked in Paris for distributor MK2 and production company Why Not during the years when both were eagerly scouting the latest American independent auteurs. But after writing a series of short films, Bidegain made his biggest career shift yet, moving into screenwriting as he wrote, with Jacques Audiard, the tough prison drama A Prophet. Since then he’s co-written all of Audiard’s […]
by Scott Macaulay on Apr 21, 2016For the first time in recent memory, it’s extremely difficult to select the top of the crop at this 53rd edition of the New York Film Festival (September 26-October 11), a question of too many contenders. I am not taking into consideration the tentpole films that anchor the festival, or any big studio movies, like Spielberg’s Bridge of Spies. That’s another kettle of fish. Down below I list what I consider the crème de la crème (appropriate phrase, considering the usual Gallic slant) and review those titles briefly. Since they will all have commercial runs, I’ll be reviewing at length […]
by Howard Feinstein on Sep 25, 2015