French movies about losers

Maya is living the ultimate fashionistas dream: she is working as a stylist for one of the French trend setters, in the capital of haute-couture: Paris. One of the IT girls of fashion, shes following her dreams until one night, when her life takes a sudden turn: shes being deported back to Morocco, after being stopped for over speeding, because her Visa expired some time ago. So in no more than 24 hours, shes deported back to her family and original country. The strong cultural shock and the judgmental differences are pushing the woman to obtain back her place in the city of dreams and her dreams, no matter the costs. But that doesn't mean she will have to return alone, as she finds other things also among her way back to the city.

Marcel Marx, a former bohemian and struggling author, has given up his literary ambitions and relocated to the port city Le Havre. He leads a simple life based around his wife Arletty, his favourite bar and his not too profitable profession as a shoeshiner. As Arletty suddenly becomes seriously ill, Marcel's path crosses with an underage illegal immigrant from Africa, who needs Marcel's help to hide from the police.

When Nénette (Josiane Balasko) discovers the identity of her father in a letter, she quickly goes off in search of him. But instead of finding her father, she is met by her half-brother, Paul (Michel Blanc). Paul, a bitter man who gave up his dream to take over his father’s pharmacy business, is less than thrilled at the arrival of his ‘embarrassing’ half-sister. After refusing to take her in, he soon gets a taste of his own medicine. Under the influence of a potent drug, for one day Paul is generous, happy and sensitive. The next morning, however, once the drug has worn off, his nasty side comes back...

Fifteen-year-old Céline knows more about life than is appropriate for her age. She wanders the streets, surviving, with the help of her boyfriend Romain, thanks to her defiance and ruthless practicality. She secretly sleeps in the garden house of a luxury villa, where one evening she is discovered by the owner, Judge Henri van Eyck. Despite his wife Nathalie's reticence, he takes the girl in and Céline gradually gains their goodwill and affection. The fragile balance of their mutual trust, however, comes in serious jeopardy when the web of lies the girl has told her protectors begins to unravel, revealing her real motives.

Romain Faubert is a 39 year old, single, medical photographer... and a raging hypochondriac. His doctor and only friend Dr. Dimitri Zvenka thinks he knows the cure for Romain: dating! But with the arrival of freedom fighter Anton Miroslav, everyone might get more then they bargained for...

3 childhood friends who have never left their hometown in the suburb try to get into porn as a way earning easy money.

Young Violetta and her mother Hannah are a peculiar couple. Ten-year-old Violetta lives a quiet life with her grandmother, while her mother Hannah is an unpredictable photographer who lives off of the generosity of others. When Hannah forces her daughter to pose as a model, Violetta finds her life with her loving grandmother turned upside down.The resulting pictures quickly become a sensation for the trendy 70's Paris art scene, and Violetta finds herself caught in between her new stature as an art muse and her dull childhood.

Leila is released from prison after five years of confinement. She will meet Yannick, a young athlete who became blind after an accident. This last practice race despite his disability, but to run it must be connected by a wire to guide a person called. It offers Leila to be his guide. Through this project, they will learn to rebuild.

Paul is a sweet man-child, raised — and smothered — by his two eccentric aunts in Paris since the death of his parents when he was a toddler. Now thirty-three, he still does not speak. Paul's aunts have only one dream for him: to win piano competitions. Although Paul practices dutifully, he remains unfulfilled until he submits to the interventions of his upstairs neighbour. Suitably named after the novelist, Madame Proust offers Paul a concoction that unlocks repressed memories from his childhood and awakens the most delightful of fantasies.

Set in the 1920s French Riviera, a master magician is commissioned to try and expose a psychic as a fraud.

An illiterate and lonely man bonds with an older and well-read woman.

The whole Bélier family is deaf, except for sixteen year old Paula who is the important translator in her parents' day to day life especially when it comes to matters concerning the family farm. When her music teacher discovers she has a fantastic singing voice and she gets an opportunity to enter a big Radio France contest the whole family's future is set up for big changes.

Bilal is 17 years old, a Kurdish boy from Iraq. He sets off on an adventure-filled journey across Europe. He wants to get to England to see his love who lives there. Bilal finally reaches Calais, but how do you cover 32 kilometers of the English Channel when you can't swim? The boy soon discovers that his trip won't be as easy as he imagined... The community of struggling illegal aliens in Calais

Paris, France, December 1897. The young playwright Edmond Rostand feels like a failure. Inspiration has abandoned him. Married and father of two children, desperate and penniless, he persuades the great actor Constant Coquelin to perform the main role in his new play. But there is a problem: Coquelin wants to premiere it at Christmas and Edmond has not written a single word.

Clumsy Monsieur Hulot finds himself perplexed by the intimidating complexity of a gadget-filled Paris. He attempts to meet with a business contact but soon becomes lost. His roundabout journey parallels that of an American tourist, and as they weave through the inventive urban environment, they intermittently meet, developing an interest in one another. They eventually get together at a chaotic restaurant, along with several other quirky characters.

Julien, 17, is wheelchair-bound due to cerebral palsy. Despite their love for him, his family is gradually falling apart under the strain of dealing with his disability. In a bid to bond with his father, Julien challenges him to participate with him in the Ironman race in Nice (French Riviera), a triathlon in which his father has previously competed.

Everyone in the village of Bouzolles knows the Tuche family, who live by the philosophy "Man is not made to work." Despite their lack of money, they strive to be happy... that is, until their hand-to-mouth existence is turned on its head. After winning the lottery, the Tuches get rich beyond their wildest dreams and move to Monaco. And while attempting to fit in in their swanky new homeland, they struggle to stay true to the same principles by which they've always lived.

Eddie, Dov, Yvan and the others ... Our warm friends have migrated from the moribund Sentier to the flourishing suburb of Aubervilliers ... Where the old Jewish entrepreneurs left the ground to young courageous and dynamic Chinese wholesalers ... The little band is as close to each other as in previous episodes, and life goes on at the mercy of small family events and business. Dov still seems frivolous, enterprising Eddie, chilled Yvan, casual Karine, resolute Sandra, naive Chochana, irresponsible Serge and mythomaniac. As for Patrick, he is in love and the happy elected is far from easy to access. Everything would be fine until a bad wind brings its share of adversity seriously compromising the cohesion of the group. Will they succumb under the storm to the turmoil, or, once again, by mutual aid, cunning and skill, will they triumph over the crisis with panache?

Redheaded teen Remy is bullied by his soccer teammates and drawn into fights with his younger sister and mother in their cramped apartment. After a flare-up of domestic violence, he flees home and is tracked down by a bitter guidance counselor, Patrick, also a redhead. Patrick looks upon Remy’s sullen insolence with both sympathy and disdain and decides to toughen him up...

Sandrine, a woman in her thirties gets tired of life in Paris and decides to leave her work in computers and become a farmer. She takes the required practice for two years, and after that she buys an isolated farm from Adrien, an old farmer who decides it's time to retire. However, Adrien wants to stay a few more months before moving away from the farm, and the rough winter finds them together...

Two outsiders travel around the countryside during school holidays.

“Having broken away from my illusory self, I was desperately seeking a path and a meaning to life.” This phrase perfectly sums up Alejandro Jodorowsky’s biographical project: reconstituting the incredible adventure of his life. Alejandro Jodorowsky was born in 1929 in Tocopilla, a coastal town on edge of the Chilean desert, where this film was shot. It was there where he discovered the fundamentals of reality, as he underwent an unhappy and alienated childhood as part of an uprooted family.

The young woman, Marie, is an outsider in the small coastal community where she has grown up. The townspeople live in fear of her and not least her mother, who is wheelchair bound, suffering from a mysterious illness. When Marie discovers her body changing – long hair growing on her chest and back – she begins searching for answers concerning her family’s hidden past. Something that will have great consequences for herself and her family – and the choices she has to make.

In Paris during WWII, an Algerian immigrant is inspired to join the resistance by his unexpected friendship with a Jewish man. Based on not very known facts about the Muslim community in Paris during WWII, when the Paris Mosque and its dynamic leader played a pivotal role in supporting the resistance and rescuing Jews.

For Pierre Brochant and his friends, Wednesday is “Idiots' Day”. The idea is simple: each person has to bring along an idiot. The one who brings the most spectacular idiot wins the prize. Tonight, Brochant is ecstatic. He has found a gem. The ultimate idiot, “A world champion idiot!”. What Brochant doesn’t know is that Pignon is a real jinx, a past master in the art of bringing on catastrophes...

A drama centered on the employees of a Nanjing massage parlor who share a common trait: they are all blind.

A summer day in Italy. The camera follows the deaf-mute Giacomo and a childhood girlfriend Stefi closely – in the woods, by the river – without wanting to disrupt the mystery of their relationship, between restrained sensuality and childhood games.

What happens when a man and a woman share a common passion? They fall in love. And this is what happens to Jean-René, the boss of a small chocolate factory, and Angélique, a gifted chocolate maker he has just hired. What occurs when a highly emotional man meets a highly emotional woman? They fall in love, and this is what occurs to Jean-René and Angélique who share the same handicap. But being pathologically timid does not make things easy for them. So whether they will manage to get together, join their solitudes and live happily ever after is a guessing matter.

A pair of losers working at department store plan to rob the place after it closes. When a bunch of kids show up begging for a story, the men launch into an improvised version of Aladdin.

An absurdist, surrealistic and shocking pitch-black comedy, which moves freely from nightmare to fantasy to hilariously deadpan humour as it muses on man’s perpetual inhumanity to man.

Babou seems to be able to shrug off anything. Real jobs, husbands, responsibilities, who needs them? But when she finds out that her own daughter is too ashamed of her to invite her to her wedding, she decides to make some changes.

A young woman begins a new life at the Apollonide bordello, a high-class brothel in Paris.

Hua, a young woman from Beijing, is a recent arrival in Paris. Exiled in an unknown city, she wanders between her tiny apartment and the university, drifting between former lovers and recent French acquaintances. She meets Matthieu, a young worker who falls madly in love with her. Possessed by an insatiable desire for her body, he treats Hua like a dog. An intense affair begins, marked by Matthieu’s passionate embraces and harsh verbal abuse. When Hua determines to leave her lover, she discovers the strength of her addiction, and the vital role he has come to play in her life as a woman.

Narrowly avoiding jail, new dad Robbie vows to turn over a new leaf. A visit to a whisky distillery inspires him and his mates to seek a way out of their hopeless lives.

During a medical examination, 13-year-old Aslan is humiliated in front of a load of his fellow pupils. The incident unleashes his latent personality disorder. Plagued by self-doubt, he strives for cleanliness and perfection and is obsessed with trying to control everything around him. His compulsion draws Aslan, who lives with his grandmother in a village in Kazakhstan, into increasingly difficult situations. He abhors the way most of his fellow pupils are held in the sway of a criminal scheme, in which Bolat, one of Aslan’s tormentors, is also involved. Bolat blackmails the younger children into paying him protection money; he has nothing but contempt for ostracised Aslan.

During World War II, two French civilians and a downed British Bomber Crew set out from Paris to cross the demarcation line between Nazi-occupied Northern France and the South. From there they will be able to escape to England. First, they must avoid German troops - and the consequences of their own blunders.

A knight and his valet are plagued by a witch, and to repair the damage they make use of the services of a wizard. However, something goes wrong and they are transported from the 12th century to the year 2000. There the knight meets some of his family and slowly learns what this new century is like. However, he still needs to get back to the 12th century to deal with the witch, so he starts looking for a wizard.

A Sicilian family deals with the arrival of a group of immigrants on their island.

A great French restaurant's owner, Monsieur Septime (Louis de Funès), is thrust into intrigue and crime, when one of his famous guests disappears.

Michel Simon gives one of the most memorable performances in screen history as Boudu, a Parisian tramp who takes a suicidal plunge into the Seine and is rescued by a well-to-do bookseller, Edouard Lestingois. The Lestingois family decides to take in the irrepressible bum, and he shows his gratitude by shaking the household to its foundations. With Boudu Saved from Drowning, legendary director Jean Renoir takes advantage of a host of Parisian locations and the anarchic charms of his lead actor to create an effervescent satire of the bourgeoisie.

A serial killer strikes fear in the hearts of residents of Hamburg during the early 1970s.

The true story of Saartjes Baartman, a black South African worker who moves to London with her master in the early 19th century. Although she dreams of being an artist, once in Europe she is exploited as a sideshow attraction due to her large buttocks and genitalia.

A young boy discovers a stray balloon, which seems to have a mind of its own, on the streets of Paris. The two become inseparable, yet the world’s harsh realities finally interfere.

This outrageous time-travel comedy follows the misadventures of a wacky medieval knight (Jean Reno) and his faithful servant when they are accidentally transported to contemporary times by a senile sorcerer. Mayhem rules as these 12th-century visitors try adapting to the wildly confusing modern world. To avoid being stuck here for good, however, they soon begin an all-out cosmic assault on their former castle -- now a luxury hotel -- in their quest to return to the past.

The tragic story of French naïve painter Séraphine Louis aka Séraphine de Senlis (1864-1942), a humble servant who becomes a gifted self-taught painter. Discovered by prominent critic and collector William Uhde, she came to prominence between the wars grouped with other naïve painters like Henri Rouseau only to descend into madness and obscurity with the onset of Great Depression and World War II.

THE EXTRA MAN is a sophisticated and moving comedy from filmmakers Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini. THE EXTRA MAN follows Louis Ives (Paul Dano), a lonely dreamer who fancies himself the hero of an F. Scott Fitzgerald novel. When a deeply embarrassing incident forces him to leave his job at an exclusive Princeton prep school, Louis heads to New York City to make a fresh start. He quickly finds a 9 to 5 job at an environmental magazine, where he encounters an entrancing, green-obsessed co-worker Mary (Katie Holmes).

After a chaotic night of rioting in a marginal suburb of Paris, three young friends, Vinz, Hubert and Saïd, wander around unoccupied waiting for news about the state of health of a mutual friend who has been seriously injured when confronting the police.

Three sisters share a connection to a violent incident from their childhood reunite to for the chance to come to terms with their past.

After a tempest, fishermen do not find only fish in their nets. That is what happens to Jafaar, a poor fisherman who lives poorly in Gaza. And what he hauls in is really upsetting: imagine that, a pig! An unclean animal judged impure not only by the Faith of Islam but also by the Jewish religion. Determined to get rid of the animal, Jafaar tries desperately to sell it, first to a United Nations official, then to a Jewish colony where Yelena raises pigs not for their meat but for security reasons. Of course, going unnoticed in the company of a "forbidden" animal, among his Palestinian brothers, past Israeli soldiers and under the scrutiny of Islamic fundamentalists is no bed of roses and a series of misadventures await Jafaar.

A recent college graduate flees to Paris after a break-up, where his involvement with a prostitute begins to reveal a potentially dark recent past.