Newest articles on The Sacramento Press written by cecile downs

SERGE! IS COMING TO TOWN...

2013-04-10T00:53:34Z

On Saturday, April 13, 2013, the Sacramento French Film Festival will bring Gainsbourg-mania to Sacramento for the fourth year in a row, with Serge! a party paying homage to one of France’s most provocative artists, Serge Gainsbourg. Featuring films, music, art and French cocktails, Serge! is one of the most fun and unique parties Sacramento has to offer!

Serge Gainsbourg, a major figure in the 1960's, ‘70's, and ‘80's pop-culture, took the world by storm through a fog of Gitanes and alcohol, reinventing himself from Gainsbourg to “Gainsbarre”! Singer-songwriter, director, actor, photographer, provocateur, and iconoclast, Gainsbourg was the lover of sex-symbol Brigitte Bardot and fathered singer-actress Charlotte Gainsbourg with famous English beauty Jane Birkin. He wrote songs for countless artists including France Gall, Vanessa Paradis, Juliette Greco, Catherine Deneuve and Isabelle Adjani. Gainsbourg is still considered one of the world's most influential and popular artists.

Serge! brings together several Sacramento musical talents: from DJs Christophe and Roger to live tribute bands Afternoon Teacup Collection and Peter Petty IS Dirge Gainsbourg. Serge! will also feature a lightshow from Rainbow Prism Atomic and local Gainsbourg inspired artwork…

A program of three short films inspired by Gainsbourg will start the evening: Une nuit qu’il etait à se morfondre… (One Night He Was Lingering Around…) by Cyril Paris, Variations sur Marilou by Félix Dufour-Lapierre and L’Histoire de Melody Nelson by Sébastien Merlet. Films will be presented in French with English subtitles. After the screening, you will dance the night away to the sound of live tribute bands and Gainsbourg songs!

Don’t forget to visit the bar for champagne, beer, wine and the SFFF’s signature Pastis cocktails served to you with an enchanting Southern French accent by Guy, the SFFF bartender!

In conjunction with its Serge! celebration, and for the first time this year, the Sacramento French Film Festival is launching a call for artists so that the Sacramento arts community can be represented on the “Gainsbourg Wall” in Paris! Gainsbourg lived at 5 bis rue de Verneuil in the 7th arrondissement from 1969 until his death in 1991. Since he passed away, artists and fans have been paying homage to him by adding graffiti, poems, collages, and stencils on the wall in front of his house, making the “Gainsbourg Wall” a constantly evolving work of art. Sacramento artists are invited to create a stencil inspired by Gainsbourg. The winning design will be stenciled on the iconic graffiti-covered wall in front of Gainsbourg’s house in Paris this summer. Entries will be judged by a team composed of members of the SFFF, Verge Center for the Arts, and local artists (deadline is May 30, 2013). Winners will be announced during the 12th Sacramento French Film Festival (June 21-30 at the Crest Theatre). More information can be found on the Sacramento French Film Festival website.

SERGE! 4th ANJNUAL GAINSBOURG TRIBUTE PARTY will happen this Saturday, April 13 at Verge Center for the Arts. 625 S Street, Downtown Sacramento.
7:30p.m. Doors and bar open!
8:00p.m. Short Film Screening.
9:00p.m. Live Music by Afternoon Teacup Collection & Peter Petty IS Dirge Gainsbourg.
10:00p.m. till 1:00a.m. French Pop Dance Party w/ DJ Christophe & DJ Roger Carpio.

The event benefits the Sacramento French Film Festival and Verge Center for the Arts.

Editor’s note: Every Thursday we deliver a local event guide straight to your inbox, right on time to make your weekend plans. Sign me up.

Disclosure: Cecile Mouette Downs is the Executive & Artistic Director of the Sacramento French Film Festival.

The 10th Sacramento French Film Festival (June 17-26, 2011) Unveils its Film Selection!

2011-05-25T23:36:00Z

The Sacramento French Film Festival will celebrate its 10th year in June 2011 and has just unveiled its exhilarating film selection and its inspired and original poster created, as were the nine previous SFFF posters, by talented Sacramento photographer Kent Lacin. See the complete poster collection here.

To be held June 17-26, 2011 at the Crest Theatre in Downtown Sacramento, the 10th Sacramento French Film Festival will present nine new premieres, two Saturday Midnight Movies, three classics, and one Short Film Program. This year the SFFF is also introducing a new category, entitled "The One That Almost Got Away" and aimed to highlight recent films that the SFFF team wished to show in previous years but was unable to, and is very happy to finally share with its audience, proving that it's never too late to enjoy an unforgettable film! Most of the films presented this year are feel good films that will make the audience reflect on the state of the current times while being highly entertained! It is certainly a pleasurable way for the SFFF to celebrate its 10th year!

A prestigious French guest.

This year's guest will be César nominated screenwriter JEAN-LOUIS MILESI, the screenwriter of director Robert Guediguian, one of France's best contemporary filmmakers. Milesi's screenplays include the joyful working class comedy MARIUS & JEANNETTE, presented this year, and the insightful social drama The Town is Quiet (La Ville est Tranquille, 2000) shown at the first SFFF in 2002. Jean-Louis Milesi directed several short films and features and he will present his sensitive feature LINO (2008) on Sunday June 19.

Hilarious opening and awaited closing films.

The 10th SFFF will open on Friday June 17th, with THE NAMES OF LOVE (LE NOM DES GENS) a hysterical comedy about sex and politics, with the bubbly rising star Sara Forestier (winner of the 2011 César -French Academy Award- for Best Actress in a Leading Role) and Jacques Gamblin. The film won the 2011 César for Best Original Screenplay. After seeing this film, maybe you will know more about what it is to be French!

After two weekends of fun, films and food, the 10th SFFF will conclude on Sunday June 26 with a tribute to French icon, singer-songwriter, and provocateur Serge Gainsbourg, in this year that marks the 20th anniversary of his death, with the exclusive and awaited presentation of the award winning biopic GAINSBOURG, A HEROIC LIFE (GAINSBOURG, VIE HÉROIQUE) directed by Joann Sfar, winner of the 2011 César for Best First feature Film. The César for Best Actor in a Leading Role went to Eric Elmosnino for his incredible portrayal of the inimitable Gainsbourg.

Other premieres include six of the best in French cinema today.

-COPACABANA, is a “dramedy”, directed by Marc Fitoussi, about a non-conformist mother (masterfully played by one of France’s most surprising actresses, Isabelle Huppert) who struggles to impress her conformist daughter (played by Huppert’s real-life daughter Lolita Chammah, winner of the Most Promising Actress Lumière Award for her performance).

-THE WOMEN ON THE 6TH FLOOR (LES FEMMES DU 6ÈME ETAGE), is a delightful comedy about conservative French bourgeois and their Spanish maids in 1960’s Paris starring Fabrice Luchini (recently seen at the Crest in Potiche) was a huge critical and box-office success when it was released in France this Spring. Directed by Philippe Le Guay.

-LINO, is an uconventional love story between a two-year-old boy and the man who finds himself reluctantly in charge of him after the death of his mother, by Jean-Louis Miles presented in the Crest Theatre by its director-actor Jean-Louis Milesi with actor Lino Milesi.

-I'M GLAD THAT MY MOTHER IS ALIVE (JE SUIS HEUREUX QUE MA MERE SOIT VIVANTE), the latest drama by Claude Miller (A Secret, Closing Film SFFF 2008, and Alias Betty, SFFF 2003) co-directed by his son, Nathan Miller, is a suspenseful and shocking story – based on true events – of the complicated relationship between a young man and the biological mother who gave him up for adoption.

-ANGÈLE & TONY, is a powerful feel good story of love and redemption set in a small fishing town in Normandy. It is the remarkable first feature by Alix Delaporte starring Clotilde Hesme (The Grocer’s Son, SFFF 2008).

-BEAUTIFUL LIES (DE VRAIS MENSONGES) is the latest vibrant comedy by Pierre Salvadori (Priceless, After You), inspired by Lubitsch and French playwright Marivaux, starring the delicious Audrey Tautou (from Amelie), Nathalie Baye and Sami Bouajila.

The 2011 classic selection is comprised of three wonderful masterpieces.

-THE YOUNG GIRLS FROM ROCHEFORT (LES DEMOISELLES DE ROCHEFORT, 1967) is a colorful musical, and tribute to Vincente Minelli’s 1950’s American musicals, by Jacques Demy, starring Catherine Deneuve, her sister Francoise Dorleac and the legendary Gene Kelly (star of An American in Paris, directed by Vincente Minelli in 1951) in an remarkable supporting role.

-MARIUS & JEANNETTE is Robert Guediguian’s funny and beautiful true love story between two middle age working class people in sunny Marseille( last year Guediguian’s film Army of Crime won the SFFF’s Audience prize). The film’s screenwriter Jean-Louis Milesi, the Festival’s special Guest, will attend.

-PIERROT LE FOU (1965), arguably Jean-Luc Godard’s best film is now considered one of the most important films in the history of cinema! Godard’s original fragmented storytelling, filming and editing styles achieve perfection and critics began talking about a true cinematic revolution. Starring a luminous Anna Karina and a cool Jean-Paul Belmondo.

Two midnight movies for a mature audience: stylish, surprising and crazy.

-THE SENTIMENT OF THE FLESH (LE SENTIMENT DE LA CHAIR, 2010), is a "Cronenbergian" romance by Roberto Garzelli, that will leave you breathless and on the edge of your seat… For those of you who are new to the genre, “Cronenbergian” is an adjective derived from David Cronenberg’s name, the Canadian filmmaker representative of the "Body Horror" genre.

-DON’T LOOK BACK (NE TE RETOURNE PAS, 2009) is a spine tingling psychological thriller by Marina de Van, starring two of France’s most beautiful and beloved actresses, Sophie Marceau and Monica Bellucci who share the same role.

“The One That Almost Got Away”

The film that the SFFF team is delighted to share with you this year is the quirky romantic and musical comedy, A MAN, A REAL MAN (UNE HOMME, UN VRAI) starring Mathieu Amalric (director and star of ON TOUR), and first feature of the acclaimed Larrieu brothers.

Midweek screenings

Traditionally held over two weekends, the 10th SFFF is adding a weekday evening to its program this year. On Wednesday June 22 there will be a rerun of Guédiguian and Milesi’s comedy MARIUS & JEANNETTE and the premiere of the quirky romance, A MAN, A REAL MAN.

Fun events around films, food and wine!

And as every year, the Festival will be seasoned by fun events. The catered Opening Reception with open bar will feature hors-d’oeuvres and desserts by Sacramento’s finest restaurants and caterers, and music by the Harley White Jr. Orchestra performing French jazzy songs. Midnight Breakfasts will follow the Saturday Midnight Movies and a Petit Déjeuner (French Breakfast) with Sacramento filmmaker Kim Leonard, director of the short PARDON HER FRENCH ~~PARDON MY FRENCH,~~ will precede the Short Film Program on Saturday June 25. And finally a fun champagne and Cake Party will conclude the exciting 10th SFFF. And of course, there will be post screening discussions with film experts and filmmakers including the Festival’s special guest, an art work exhibition curated by Sacramento artist Cherie Hacker, and some surprises…

Passes to the Sacramento French Film Festival are like plane tickets to France… Except that you only have to travel to Downtown Sacramento!

The 10th Sacramento French Film Festival runs June 17-19, 22 & 25-26, 2011 in the main auditorium of the Crest Theatre.
All films are presented in French with English subtitles.

You can find ticket prices, the complete schedule, film descriptions, trailers and more on the SFFF website: www.SacramentoFrenchFilmFestival.org

Disclosure: Cecile Downs is Executive & Artistic Director of the French Film Festival.

The Sacramento French Film Festival celebrates French icon Serge Gainsbourg!

2011-03-28T14:29:00Z

2011 marks the 20th anniversary of the passing of French icon Serge Gainsbourg, who died of a heart attack on March 2, 1991. Born in 1928, Gainsbourg would have turned 82 this year. To honor his memory, the Sacramento French Film Festival, Record Club and The Verge Center for the Arts are hosting a tribute party. It all starts at 8pm on Saturday April 2nd at the Verge Gallery and will feature music videos, film clips, live tribute bands and music by DJ’s Christophe and Roger.

Twenty years after his death Serge Gainsbourg is still considered one of the world's most influential popular musicians. If you are not already familiar with his music, it’s not too late to get to know him. He is best known as a singer-songwriter and for his wild personal life, led through a thick haze of Gitanes cigarette smoke and alcohol. Gainsbourg is still today a major figure of France's pop-culture. He wrote not only for himself but also for a number of illustrious singers: his lovers Juliette Greco and Brigitte Bardot, his wife Jane Birkin, his daughter Charlotte Gainsbourg, singers Frances Gall and Vanessa Paradis and actresses Catherine Deneuve and Isabelle Adjani, to name only a few. He was also a filmmaker, an actor, a photographer, and an extremely provocative iconoclast, who made sexual advances to a young- and petrified- Whitney Houston on French television and adapted the French national anthem to reggae music.

The Sacramento French Film Festival will pay further homage to Gainsbourg during its 10th edition in June 2011, with the presentation of the acclaimed and award-winning feature film “Gainsbourg: Vie Heroique”- directed by Joann Sfar, winner of two 2011 Césars (French Academy Awards): Best Actor in a Leading Role (for Eric Elmosnino) and Best First Feature Film.

The Gainsbourg party will feature music by DJ’s Christophe and Roger, music videos, film clips and live tribute bands including "the Horrorscopes" and “ the Harley White Jr. Trio featuring Peter Petty".

WHEN: Saturday April 2, 2011 – Doors at 8pm / Bands at 9pm.

WHERE: Verge Gallery – 625 S Street. - Downtown Sacramento.

PHONE: 916 455 9390: SFFF / 916 448 2985: Verge gallery.

TICKET INFORMATION: $5 Admission, to benefit the 10th Sacramento French Film Festival and the Verge Gallery.

The Sacramento French Film Festival presents a "Cinema-Concert" featuring The Italian Straw Hat, a Classic Silent Comedy, with Live Music performed by the Sacramento Philharmonic Orchestra

2011-01-06T20:08:53Z

For the Sacramento French Film Festival, 2011 is a milestone year: one of the most acclaimed film festivals in town will celebrate its 10th year. This special anniversary will be held at the Crest Theatre on June 17-26 but the team of the SFFF has planned other events to make 2011 the year of French cinema in Sacramento and it all starts this month with a prestigious and one-of-a-kind “Cinema-Concert”, featuring a silent comedy with live orchestra.

On January 29th and 30th, The SFFF will bring to Sacramento the North-American Premiere of Un Chapeau de Paille d'Italie (An Italian Straw Hat), directed by renowned French filmmaker René Clair, with a new musical score. For this first-time event, the SFFF is collaborating with the Sacramento Philharmonic Orchestra. This unique partnership is good news for the local art scene, and not surprising coming from two local arts organizations recognized for their dynamism and the high quality and originality of their programs.

René Clair’s hilarious 1928 comedy, one of the most famous silent French films, will be presented with the new score written by contemporary French composer, Raymond Alessandrini. Alessandrini, who has traveled from France especially for the occasion, will conduct an orchestra of twelve principal musicians from the Sacramento Philharmonic, including an accordion player of course!

Based on a play by vaudeville playwright Eugène Labiche, An Italian Straw Hat is a highly entertaining typically French farce: Fadinard is on his way to his wedding when his horse eats the hat of a married woman who was spending time with her lover in the bushes of the bois de Vincennes... To avoid her dishonor, Fadinard must find the very same rare hat, made out of straw from Italy. This will greatly disturb his wedding plans… for our guilty pleasure. Famous film critic Pauline Kael described An Italian Straw Hat as “One of the funniest films ever made... so expertly timed and choreographed that farce becomes ballet.”

There will be only two performances of this fun-filled event featuring a rare 35mm restored print from the French repository of film archives, the Cinémathèque Française: Saturday January 29th at 8pm, and Sunday January 30th at 2pm, at the Crest Theatre, home of the SFFF since 2003.

Tickets are on sale at tickets.com, by phone at 1-800-225-2277 or in person at the Crest Theatre. Tickets purchased at the Crest Theatre do not incur any fee.

More information can be found at www.SacramentoFrenchFilmFestival.org

Cécile Downs is the Artistic and Executive Director of the Sacramento Frnehc Film Festival.

Sacramento: A City That Works For Everyone: How Does Central Sacramento Work For Families?

2009-10-29T19:22:29Z

On Monday, October 19th, parents of the charter school California Montessori Project (CMP)-Capitol Campus where surprised to learn through a letter from CMP Director, Gary Bowman, that Mr. Raymond, the new Superintendent of the Sacramento City Unified School District (SCUSD), was requesting that the Capitol Campus be relocated from the Old Marshall School (2718 G Street), a facility the school had moved into only 3 months prior, because the building was now deemed unsafe. The Capitol Campus is to be relocated in the Thomas Jefferson Elementary School (in the College Glen area) far from the current location forcing hundreds of families on the roads. Moreover the campus has to leave the premises in a hurry, in the middle of the school year -the move has already been planned for November 11th- even though parents learned through a subsequent letter from Gary Bowman (dated Thursday October 22nd) that there is "no imminent danger" and even though no one has yet seen the full report on which the SCUSD based its decision. Parents were not consulted, either about the time frame or by the choice of the new location. There is a perception among the parents community that the SCUSD is forcing a hasty decision in order to facilitate some ulterior plan. Read more here

Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson's slogan for Sacramento is "A City That Works For Everyone". How can the central city work for families if school are disappearing? CMP- Capitol Campus is the only Charter School offering a free-tuition Montessori education in the downtown/midtown area, attracting an extremely diverse community of families. The rightly named “Capitol Campus” has been in existence for eight years (first in the Pioneer Church on L Street, then since August 2009, in the Old Marshall School, where it was able to receive more students and extend its offering to 7th and 8th graders). Many families have made the choice to live in the downtown area because they believe in minimizing their environmental impact and improving the quality of life by living close to work and school. Last August, the Old Marshall School neighborhood community welcomed the school with open arms and big smiles, it was viewed as an important moment in the life of our city. Read more here. Parents are worried that their vision to make midtown more friendly and welcoming to families will never materialize if there are no schools to support families.

Open letter to Susan Miller, Associate Superintendent Sacramento City Unified

Dear Susan Miller,

Thank you for your message, even though it is a form letter that all parents received as a reply; and even though it came when everything had already been decided without any real input from us, the parents. This doesn't reflect a real concern for our situation! Only SCUSD Board member Jerry Houseman has shown a real interest in our problem by engaging into individual and thoughtful conversations, not only with me but with all the parents from whom he had received a letter.

We are forced to move but we still haven't seen the famous report from the architects and engineers hired by the District that claim that the Old Marshall School is not in compliance with the California Building Codes. We, as parents, are very curious to learn what the real problem with the school is: how exactly is the Old Marshall Building not in compliance? When are we going to be able to see and review the full report?

I was looking forward to meeting Superintendent Jonathan Raymond on November 3rd but now I am worried that he will give us the same kind of general, non-specific answers.

It is indeed "most unfortunate" -to quote your words- that our whole school Community has to be uprooted to the College Glen area, nice in itself but not what I signed up for when I enrolled my kids into the "CAPITOL" Campus of CMP. I will now have to spend 20 to 30 minutes on the freeway to take my kids to school every day (which is almost 2 hours in the car each day) when our commute to school is right now only 7 minutes (less than 30 minutes per day in the car).

If I had wanted to drive so far just so that my children would have a soccer field near their school or a real multi-purpose room, I could have signed up for another CMP Campus. What is now the choice of the parents who have chosen the environmentally conscious lifestyle of living, working, shopping, entertaining, and taking their kids to school in downtown Sacramento?

How is it more safe for our family to drive so long to go to school? There is more chance that my children would get injured in a car accident than there is that the Old Marshall School would ever fall on their heads!

We had a nice location at the Pioneer Church that we were outgrowing, so yes we were looking for another location in the downtown area, but we could have stayed there another year or two, till we find the perfect place... Now we have no choice but to take our kids to a distant school or leave CMP in the middle of the school year, which as you know very well is an almost impossible task, not only because the schools are full but because of the hardship it would impose on our children.

The only real support from the District that I would have been grateful for would have been if you had helped us find a location in the downtown area (even if it was only a temporary solution), by working in collaboration with the state or even commercial building owners, so that our families could have remained where we have chosen to be by enrolling our kids into the CMP Capitol Campus.

Sincerely,
Cecile Downs, a distressed and frustrated parent of two CMP students.