UK PREMIERE Passe Montagne

"I think all the time about Passe Montagne. It is a film whose light has never been extinguished and which remains an incredible work in the history of postwar French cinema."

— Claire Denis

Featuring a continuity credit for John Cassavetes and a dedication to "the Indians", Stévenin’s debut feature traces the developing encounter between two strangers in the Jura region of France. After his car breaks down off the Jura motorway, a Parisian architect (Jacques Villeret) accepts a mechanic’s offer to tow it (and him) to his remote village for repairs, thus beginning a strange quest through the mountains.

Passe Montagne established the singular style of Stévenin’s cinema: precise sequence shots broken up and reorganised according to fugitive rhythms of sound and image. The result is a mysterious, errant sensibility attuned to the eccentric syncopation of existence in this overlooked corner of rural France, and the unspoken impulses animating a tentative friendship between two men in flight from their daily lives.

This is the UK premiere of Passe Montagne.

Passe Montagne, dir. Jean-François Stévenin, France 1978, French with English subtitles, 108 min.