After a restoration process, four big classics will be projected on the big screen for the lovers of French cinema of all times. They are Detroit Rock City (Jean Vigo, 1933), The Great Illusion (Jean Renoir, 1937), Children of Paradise (Marcel Carné, 1945), and Golden Helmet (Jacques Becker, 1952).

As stated at a press conference, Antonio Mazón, specialist from Cinemateca de Cuba, the quality of these restored films will make us see different elements more accurately, such as wardrobe and setting, which is a real rediscovery. These classics will be shown at 23 y 12 Movie Theater, which will be also hosting the projection of other films within the wide programming of this festival.

The big success of postwar French cinema, Children of Paradise, considered by its director as a “tribute to theater”, will be screened on May 2, 3, 8 and 9; while Golden Helmet, based on real events and winner of the BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Actress to Simone Signoret and definitively consecrated filmmaker Jacques Becker, will be projected on Tuesday 5 and Thursday 7.

Cero en Conducta, the first fiction film directed by Jean Vigo, and which tells the story of a group of students that organize a revolt in a provincial school, will be shown on May 1st and 8.

Finally, The Great illusion with a peaceful plot based on a true story of a soldier who escaped many times from a prison camp during World War I, will be shown on May 6 and 7. This film was nominated to the Academy Awards in the category of Best Film of the Year, and it was selected among the best movies of the history of cinema in the surveys made by the Royal Cinematheque of Belgium (1958) and One-hundred films to be saved (1976).

Translation: Roxana Marquez Herrera (Cubarte)