The Hong Kong French Film Festival returns with classics for its 53rd year
The fest kicks off at City Hall with this year’s Cannes fave L’Amour Ouf and includes Q&A sessions with featured filmmakers and actors
From Tuesday to December 10, across seven cinemas in Hong Kong, that distinctive continental flair returns to the silver screen with the 53rd Hong Kong French Film Festival. Organised by the Alliance Française de Hong Kong, this year’s festival will showcase 45 au-courant French films at venues such as Broadway Cinematheque and Palace IFC, many of which premiered over the summer, or are slated for release in the coming months.
The programme kicks off at City Hall with L’Amour Ouf (Beating Hearts), an operatic romantic crime drama directed by Gilles Lellouche that screened at the Cannes Film Festival to much acclaim. Watch for stand-out features such as New Wave founder François Truffaut’s 1959 coming-of-age story Les Quatre Cents Coups (The 400 Blows), which remains a cornerstone of French cinema; Une Famille (A Family), a 2024 autobiographical documentary by writer Christine Angot that follows a reckoning with her personal history as a victim of rape and incest; and Saint-Ex, which follows a period in the life of The Little Prince author and aviator Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, who, in 1930, led an aerial mission in the Andes to rescue a stranded friend and colleague.
Also screening is the 1962 classic Jules et Jim, which continues to captivate audiences with its tale of love and friendship set against the backdrop of World War I. Lighter fare includes Les Bronzés font du ski (1979) and Camping (2006), falling squarely into the French tradition of blending comedy with social commentary.
For cinema-goers seeking more insight into Gallic film culture, the schedule includes a plethora of discussions and Q&A sessions with featured filmmakers and actors, including comedian and director Franck Dubosc, animator and producer Claude Barras, and filmmaker Antoine Chevrollier.
Since its inception in 1953, the Alliance Française de Hong Kong has screened more than 1,600 films through the festival, founded in the same year, claiming the title of the oldest film festival in Hong Kong.
Tickets HK$75 to HK$110; hkfrenchfilmfestival.com
