All About Ozon March 9–19, 2017

Istanbul Modern Cinema presents its first retrospective of the films of François Ozon, one of the young masters of French cinema. A graduate of the prestigious film school La Femis (the alma mater of names like Louis Malle, Alain Resnais, and Claire Denis), Ozon has been making about one film per year since embarking on his directorial career in the late 1990s.

After directing various short films, Ozon came into the spotlight with his first feature film Sitcom (1998), a foretaste of the freewheeling cinematic style and whimsical, kitschy narratives of his subsequent period. Sitcom was followed by Water Drops on Burning Rocks (Gouttes d’Eau sur Pierres Brûlantes, 2000), adapted from the never-performed play of the same name by Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Here, Ozon displays his reverence for melodrama and his interest in absurdist humor, over-the-top style, and LGBT characters. The same year saw the release of Under the Sand (Sous le Sable), marking a new direction for Ozon’s always vibrant, provocative cinematic oeuvre: this powerful drama was hailed as a “masterpiece” by none other than Ingmar Bergman. Ozon proved he was up to the task of making big-budget films with his next two works: 8 Women (8 Femmes, 2002), a musical whodunit recalling 1950s Hollywood melodramas (and featuring a cast of iconic French actresses), and Swimming Pool (2003), a tale of intrigue and suspense starring Charlotte Rampling. For all Ozon’s eclectic, prolific, accomplished cinematic oeuvre, it was with In the House (Dans la Maison, 2012) that he achieved his much-desired international breakthrough. Finally, we have Ozon’s 16^th feature film Frantz, a black-and-white period piece starring Paula Beer (whose performance won her the Marcello Mastroianni Award for Best New Young Actor or Actress at the Venice Film Festival). A novel departure from Ozon’s other films, Frantz demonstrates that his cinematic trajectory is never boring or predictable.The selection includes all of Ozon’s feature films as well as some of his short films.