Screening Dates
  • September 14, 2020 8:30
  • September 16, 2020 6:30
  • September 18, 2020 6:30
  • September 19, 2020 4:00
  • September 21, 2020 6:30
New Restoration

“Extraordinary … Prepare to be blown away.”

Geoff Andrew, Time Out

French luminary Claire Denis’s consensus masterpiece, unavailable when we presented our Denis retrospective in 2019, returns to the screen in a beautiful new restoration! Haunting and hypnotic, Beau Travail re-imagines Melville’s Billy Budd as a tale of erotic desire, repression, and jealousy set in the French Foreign Legion. Leos Carax regular Denis Lavant is drill sergeant Galoup, overseeing raw recruits at an outpost in Djibouti. Galoup secretly harbours feelings for his commander, Bruno Forestier (Michel Subor). The arrival of Sentain (Grégoire Colin), an attractive young solder, arouses further feelings of desire — but also envy and obsession. Denis’s elliptical approach to storytelling renders this all-male world with well-etched small details. The soundtrack features excerpts from Benjamin Britten’s opera of Billy Budd, while elements of dance inform the strikingly balletic choreography of certain scenes. This is a stunning, shimmering work of uncommon poetry and visual beauty. The Bruno character first appeared in Godard’s 1960 film Le Petit Soldat, where he was also played by Subor!

“Thrilling … A gorgeous mirage of a movie.”

Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader

“Spellbinding … None of this gifted French filmmaker’s previous work has prepared us for the voluptuous austerity of Beau Travail.”

Stephen Holden, New York Times
Media