ÉCU is in Cannes soaking up the sun, sights and sounds. But it's not all play, we've had meetings galore, met some incredibly talented filmmakers and told everybody in the Palais about The European Independent Film Festival! Bienvenue au Festival de Cannes! Nous avions beaucoup de rendezvous, rencontrions des cineastes talentueux et racontions tout le monde du Festival Européen du Film Indépendant!  Check out more photos here   ...

Hey ÉCU Film Festival fans! Our team is going to be attending the highly anticipated Cannes Film Festival from May 14th to May 21st keeping you all up to date via Facebook posts, Twitter tweets and even a few vlogs featuring:   Interviews Videos Photos Cool articles Hints & Tips   So stay tuned for more! http://www.ecufilmfestival.com/en/ecu-live-at-cannes/   -------------------- Salut les fans ÉCU Film Fe...

Forum des Images’s ‘Series Mania’ event from the 10th – 17th April included projections in cinemas of the latest American, British and French TV series and several round table sessions hosted by experts where the public could discuss the themes, characters and cinematography of the various series. I use the word ‘cinematography’ because this really was at the heart of every debate throughout the week; can we still distinguish between a television series and a film...

From cameras and costumes to cahiers and clippings, the Cinémathèque Francaise’s Kubrick season is an insightful exhibition for everyone from cinema novices to devoted followers alike. First things first, let me just say that I am no great expert on Kubrick. I’ve seen his major films (with mixed reactions) and I’ve read articles with a passing interest, but he’s not a director for whom I’ve scrambled though library back catalogues to find first edition copies...

Meet, Katharina Kowalewski. She has directed over 100 fashion videos with her company KO.FASHION for clients such as Vogue, Swarovski, Bild, Keylooks and Stylebop. Her first short, co-directed with Nadine Strittmatter, “Sweet Focus” will be at the “Short Film Corner” in Cannes this year. The movie was shot in one week in Arosa in the Swiss Mountains and is about two sisters. Eva lives in the mountains and has spent all of her life caring for her recently passed awa...

Seven months ago when I applied to work as an intern for ÉCU -The European Independent Film Festival (aka Fun European Project as it said in the Craiglist job ad!) I had no idea what I was getting myself into. During these months I have met some of the most interesting people ever, worked hard, played hard, but most important enjoyed my time while working for the “Fun European Project”. My position at the festival has been marketing coordinator, which has been fun an...

Need extra shock resistance on location? The New rugged G-DRIVE duro is coming soon from G-Technology! Rugged good looks and G-Technology’s known quality go hand-in-hand with the new G-DRIVE duro portable drive. This sleek external drive has a shock-resistant exterior that helps protect it in case it tumbles out of your gear bag while you’re shooting your next production. Pre-formatted for Macs, the G-DRIVE duro portable drive is FireWire 800 and USB 2.0 equipped, bus...

by Marc Rickenbach In recent months French filmmaker and arts and crafts enthusiast Michel Gondry has been popping his head up all over the place on both sides of the Atlantic. The director, most well known for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Science of Sleep (not to mention numerous music videos, which we’ll get to in a bit), released the big screen version of old time radio and comic book hero The Green Hornet in January. To promote the new film, he guest dir...

by Kathryn Hall My flatmate and I set a house rule to only watch French films while living in Paris, to better ‘immerse’ ourselves in our adoptive land’s language and culture and so on. Though we push it at times, (’Jean Reno’s French, so I guess we can justifiably watch Léon again…’) this has led us to stumble upon a couple of less widely remembered French films. The first was Les Amants du Pont Neuf, directed by Leos Carax – a very late-’80s/early-�...

Jean-Christophe Bouvet is a French actor known for playing in films by Jean-Claude Biette, Claude Chabrol, Soffia Coppola, Jean-Luc Godard, Jean-Claude Guiguet, Maurice Pialat, Vecchiali Paul, Gerard Krawczyk, etc. After studying linguistics, semiotics, psychoanalysis and sociology, he started working in TV in 1968 with Téchiné in “The Banquet” in 1977 and starring in “The Machine” by Paul Vecchiali. He then directed his own series “Les aventures de Jacques T...

Eurochannel is the world television channel with 100% European programming content focused on European culture and lifestyle throughout movies, series and other programs dedicated to European culture. In Europe, Eurochannel is currently available in Portugal, and soon more European countries such as France, will receive Eurochannel. Available in 27 countries and reaching 10.5 million households, Eurochannel is dedicated to spreading European culture to people around ...

ÉCU is happy to announce our new partnership with Avanca Film Festival! Avanca, a festival established in 1997, invites filmmakers from all around the world to submit their short films, feature films, documentaries, and experimental videos! Avanca has sent some of their award winning films in for submission to ÉCU, including Conto Do Vento, A Ria,A Ana, O Honen, and Desta Agua. Hamilton Trindade, a representative from Avanca, will be participating in our judging submissio...

As part of G-Technology’s ongoing support for the ÉCU community as platinum sponsor, we’ll be bringing you regular exclusive interviews from filmmakers and producers in the field, sharing top hints and tips. This month the award-winning student director and ÉCU judge, Louisa Mayman gives us exclusive tips for student filmmakers. Louisa Mayman’s Top Tips for Student Filmmakers 1. Be a nuisance! But be a polite nuisance. I take my CV round with me everywhere and...

by Marie-Charlotte Fossard Three friends, three personalities and three differents way of living and loving clearly defined. Antoine, Bibi and Casimir is the story of the daily tempestuous relationships of three housemates. Life, friendship, and unexpected love are the key words for the comedy, only available on the internet. François Chabert and Laurent Jeanne are the writers and directors of this unusual series. Their everyday life is somewhat out of the ordinary...

The exhibition of Nantes-born video artist Pierrick Sorin, currently nestled in blacked out corners at Centquatre, is very much a one-man sketch show. Practicing the method of autofilmage, Sorin often assumes several roles simultaneously, with superimposition allowing for their interaction. His characters are both comical and endearing, in scenarios fictional yet relatable to real life. Though it may seem an introspective technique, Sorin’s work looks into aspects related to...

by Marc Rickenbach I was thinking recently about where we might see a crossover between music videos and films. There’s the obvious: some form of a narrative, maybe an experimental/auteur edge and some music videos even directly allude to films. But for the most part music videos stand as their own ‘genre’ of cinematic form. Then, not so long ago, a friend of mine sent me a video that could have been pulled directly from the young mind of Wes Craven. Or Satan. It wa...

Following last month’s exciting announcement of the overall winner of our Driven Creativity Competition, check out this exclusive video of the gallery exhibition of shortlisted work! The video was taken at the private launch night of the exhibition, held in London’s Brick Lane, and looks at what creativity means to the winning entrants. We also recently had an inspiring chat with the competition’s amateur film winner – Ke Nguyen and his stop motion photography animation Hayf...

Bringing a feminine approach to the largely-masculine dominated cinematic era of the Nouvelle Vague, Agnes Varda has been a pioneer of French feminist cinema for over 40 years. Cléo de 5 à 7 traces 2 hours in a woman’s life as she travels around Paris anxiously awaiting medical test results. One of the key scenes in the film takes place at Parc Montsouris in the 14th arrondissement, and Jen Wallace headed over there to discover which landmarks featured in the movie can still be f...