Daniel Ivernel

A retelling of Homer's The Odyssey, focusing on Ulysses's ten-year journey home to Ithaca following the Trojan War, where he faces various mythical challenges while his wife Penelope fends off suitors.

Here we find a group of misfits who've given up on humanity and have decided to dwell below the pavement. The group has its own hierarchy, of course, and soon the conditions that drove them underground begin to manifest themselves without the influences of the Outside World.

Darien, a left-wing police informant, is forced to lure his old friend Sadiel to Paris, allegedly to film a television special about the Third World. Sadiel, the exiled leader of a North African state, is being hunted by the ruthless Colonel Kassar, who will stop at nothing to capture his political rival. Once Sadiel arrives in Paris, Darien realizes he has been manipulated. He tries to turn back the clock, not realizing what or who he’s truly dealing with.

Celestine has a new job as a chambermaid for the quirky M. Monteil, his wife and her father. When the father dies, Celestine decides to quit her job and leave, but when a young girl is raped and murdered, Celestine believes that the Monteils' groundskeeper, Joseph, is guilty, and stays on in order to prove it. She uses her sexuality and the promise of marriage to get Joseph to confess -- but things do not go as planned.

The film follows the life of Napoleon from his early life in Corsica to his death at Saint Helena. The film is notable for its use of location shooting for numerous scenes, especially at the French estates of Malmaison and Fontainebleau, the Palace of Versailles, and sites of Napoleonic battles including Austerlitz and Waterloo.

A man accused of murder discovers a trail of corruption leading to the powerful family of his former love. Going underground, he seeks allies in a town where trust is scarce.

Port of Marseille, France, recently liberated from the German yoke. Caught as stowaways aboard a ship, Manon, a young woman who was accused of collaborating with the Nazis, and Robert, a freedom fighter who saved her from reprisals, tell the captain about the many challenges they have had to face in order to survive.

In 1930s Marseilles two small-time crooks decide to join forces when they meet while brawling over a woman. Starting with fixed horse races and boxing matches, they soon find themselves doing jobs for the local gangster bosses. When they decide to go into the business for themselves, their easy-going approach to crime starts to change.

Young sailor Edmond Dantès is wrongfully imprisoned, escapes, finds treasure, and reinvents himself as the wealthy Count of Monte Cristo to exact revenge on those who betrayed him.

Marseille. Heaps of flowers and funeral wreaths... "A man who no longer defends his colors is no longer a man."

Handsome and rich Spanish gentleman abandons his wife and riches for his love of a young girl of poor stock who taunts and degrades him.

A group of ex-resistance fighters are brought together by Marie-Octobre, the code name of Marie-Helene Dumoulin. The former members of the network have carried on with their lives after the war, but this evening they are going to have to live again a fateful night – the night their leader was killed. He had been betrayed, his name given to the Germans. The search for the traitor puts each personality in the spotlight – and also that of the killed leader, Castille.

Director Jean Delannoy's immediate followup to his brilliant Les Jeux sont Faits was the more conventional Aux Yeux du Souvenir (aka Souvenir and To the Eyes of Memory). The film is based on a true story, wherein an France airliner managed to survive a journey from Rio De Janeiro to Dakar with two of its engines incapacitated. To this already intensely dramatic situation has been added a romantic subplot involving Claire Magny (Michele Morgan) and Jacques Forester (Jean Marais). The love story adds very little to the film; fortunately, neither does it detract from the film's overall quality. As was the case with many French productions of the 1940s, Aux Yeux du Souvenir benefits immeasurably from the Wagnerian musical score by Georges Auric.

Two scriptwriters argue about the fate of Henrietta, a charming and gamine shopgirl. One favors a comical path for their heroine, who is overcome with sentimental love for a young photographer on Bastille Day. The other has a more thrilling and dastardly fate in mind for her. Among the film's irresistible conceits is Hildegarde Neff as an oversexed circus bareback rider.

Campana, a commissar at the drugs bureau of Paris police gets an undercover job in Nice to catch an Italian-French mafia boss. As he slips into the identity of a gangster's brother, who was already killed, he has to play the role of a loving husband with child - something that is not so easy for a confirmed single like Campana. Unfortunately American killers chase behind the Nice mafia clan too, in order to get control of French drug trades to USA.

"La neige était sale" is based on a novel and play by the phenomenally prolific Georges Simenon. Upon learning that his mother was a prostitute, Frank (Daniel Gélin) dejectedly vows that he, too, will live a life of debauchery. Part of his self-degradation program is to kill someone, and since the story takes place during the Nazi occupation of France, he chooses a German officer as his victim. His steady descent into psychosis and depravity becomes his ultimate undoing.

A man is alone in Paris during the month of August while his woman and children go on vacation. He meets a young English girl posing as a model who came to Paris for a shoot.

Via Something Weird: "Four men representing the world’s great criminal organizations unite to locate a cache of sunken treasure. The treasure is in fact a fortune in diamonds and secret documents that was lost by the Germans in the seas off Monte Carlo during the war. Following their every move are representatives from every secret agency in the world, amongst them, the British, the Russians, the Germans, and the Americans, all seeking the important papers contained within the treasure."

In this French crime thriller, you can leave the mob, but the mob won't leave you. Louis (Jean Yanne) has retired to a Thailand plantation with an Asian wife and child. Back in Marseilles, however, because a no-holds-barred gang war has broken out, Louis' large collateral family is wiped out, and he is family are slated for destruction.

Three stories, very different in space and time. Lysistrata, a dancer from ancient times, Jeanne d'Arc, medieval warrior and Elisabeth, American war widow who comes on pilgrimage in Italy.

The tragic story of a young orphan girl who is befriended by an innocent but emotionally disabled veteran of the French Indochina War.

Paul, a former womanizer, marries the head of the medical department's "unattractive" daughter Christine because he thinks attractive women can't be trusted and make poor wives. A car accident leaves him bedridden and he begins to miss his playboy days, when Christine's bombshell sister Martine arrives and Paul decides he must have her. He begins drugging Christine at night so he can sneak out to kill of Martine's many suitors one by one.

A woman who has a terrible secret to conceal takes refuge on a barge.

She dragged out a more than mediocre life in the port of Antwerp; he is a renowned pianist-virtuoso. These two solitary beings, totally different, meet by chance on a liner and gradually realize that they complement each other harmoniously.

In August 1952, a family of British tourists is found by the roadside in Haute Provence, brutally murdered. In the ensuing, very public, investigation a local landowner, 75 year old Gaston Dominici, is arrested for the murders, having been denounced by his sons. Under police interrogation, Dominici confesses to have killed the family and it looks certain that he will be charged, tried and sentenced to death. But then the case begins to collapse. The old man retracts his confession and the lack of evidence against him becomes apparent…

It was the reign of Louis XV and, in 1750, France was at war all the time, and the people, suffocated by taxes, liked their beloved Louis less and less. When the governor of Dauphiné arrived in Saint-Étienne-de-Saint-Geoirs, he had to deal with opponents of the regime who had gathered around cooper Louis Mandrin. Mandrin becomes the vigilante who respects his king, but does not tolerate the oppression of the poor through taxation.

Henri IV falls in love with the young Charlotte de Montmorency, 40 years his junior. The king decided to marry her off to his nephew, Henri de Condé, so that he could later make her his mistress.

Fates of multiple otherwise disconnected characters intertwine miraculously under the sky of Paris. And it all happens in one day.

The Wizard of Heaven tells the compelling and remarkable story of St. John Marie Baptist Vianney, the humble pastor of Ars, France, who battled with the devil himself, not only for the faith of his parish, but even for that of his country. Starting with the Saint's arrival at Ars, this film brings to life the hardships, indifference, ridicule and opposition he encountered, as well as the zeal with which he strove to overcome them.

Over the course of one night, a gang of twelve criminals carry out a commando-like raid on a small town.

Jean-Marie Fayard is a young examining magistrate in a large provincial french city. He belongs to that generation of judges who are endeavoring to re-adapt the notion of justice to our changing times. His methods are not agreeable to every one. Criticism and pressure are brought to bear upon him but he is aware of his value, professionally, and refuses to make any concessions. He follows an unwavering course. He uses dynamic methods and takes uncustomary initiatives. He behaves like a crusader, a battler, whence the nickname given him by the reporters : the sheriff.

Richard is a private detective. He makes a good money from marital infidelity: the deceived husband and wife generously paid him for proof of their infidelity "halves"...

Smuggler's Ball is the English-language title for this French-Belgian seriocomedy. The action takes place along the borders separating Belgium, Holland and France. It is here that the worldly Pierre (J. P. Kieran) carries on a profitable smuggling operation, all the while romancing Siska (Christian Lenier), the daughter of a local customs official. Various subplots and secondary characters weave in and out as the plotline guides the viewer through the WW II years. Towards the end, the story shifts gears when the Benelux Frontier Agreement eliminates all government regulations. The film's screenplay is by Charles Spaak, himself the descendant of a Belgian political family, and thus well-versed in bureaucracy and red tape.

Simone and Jean have just married and, looking for a home in the Paris region, are lucky enough to find a house with a garden in a residential suburb. Expecting their first child, the young couple began to observe how the parents of neighboring families were raising theirs.

Emperor Claudius had a son, Britannicus, before marrying Agrippina and adopting her son Nero, born of a previous marriage. Nero succeeded Claudius and ruled the Empire. Despite his reign, Nero decides to free himself from his mother's yoke and take revenge on Britannicus, the brother who has everything and whom he envies.

Everyday life of fishermen on Brittany's Ile de Sein.

In 1930, on the island of Noronha in Brazil, the inmates of the penitentiary revolt. Frédéric Coulibaud, head of the aeropostale radio station, and his team-mates Mastic and Froment, try to prevent them from entering the concession where the island's governor and his daughter have taken refuge. They manage to repair the radio so as to follow and guide Mermoz as he attempts to cross the South Atlantic for the 53rd time. The aviator is forced to ditch and is picked up by a boat. Their mission accomplished, Coulibaud and his team boarded a British ship that had come to their rescue.

The daughter of a seamstress, Jeanne Bécu could hardly imagine she would later become one of the most influential women of the Kingdom of France...

After the discovery of two murders, Commissioner Chabrier, of the French secret services, is investigating the disappearance of plans affecting the national defense of the country robbed by a gang of international spies.

The inhabitants of the windswept island of Sein, in the 19th-century Brittany, follow their own religion without need for clergy, but as strangers arrive, their faith and beliefs face a deep crisis.

Montmartre in the summertime. A group of street urchins idles outside while the other kids of the neighborhood are away on holiday.To keep the gang busy, Pivolo, their leader, has an idea : they are going to kidnap Aunt Faguet's doggy. Just for the fun of it. A few days pass after the crime is accomplished and one of them suddenly realizes that a reward is being offered by the aunt to anyone who would bring her her pet back. Mademoiselle Hélène, the kind-hearted social worker, does it for them and gives them the reward money, which is instantly exchanged for lollipops, nougat and merry-go-round and cinema tickets. So, why not continue? That's what they do, abducting several dogs, until they realize they are becoming ... too rich! They can't buy themselves luxurious gifts or else their parents are bound to suspect something. Instead, they decide to do good by helping poor people around them. One day, Pierrot, a member of the gang, gets run down by a cyclist and becomes blind.

In southern Morocco, a hold-up is organized on the road linking the northern towns to a major factory built on a gold deposit. Several accomplices have perfected a carefully thought-out "scenario" that should bring them success. Travis, a specialist, and his mistress, Lila, a former barmaid, "work" in liaison with Vibert, the mine engineer. José, the local mechanic, and Georges, the truck driver, have already been sacrificed.

With the help of a social worker and Isabelle, Pierre, a delinquent influenced by Marcelle, undertakes a slow and difficult reintegration.

Jean-Baptiste Rousse, nicknamed Noble Coeur, a journeyman carpenter in a village in Bigorre, was deported in 1942. On his return, he realizes that his compatriots have let the wood reserves on his building site be stolen. After an altercation with the mayor, he decides to take justice into his own hands and, with the help of his son Roland, cuts down the trees in the communal forest to pay him back. The mayor alerts the police. Noble Coeur takes refuge in the bell tower and, when the mayor refuses to let him bring in his wood, he demolishes it with an axe.

A young rogue kills an old lady to rob her. Arrested, he believes it is for this crime, hides nothing from his lawyer, who soon tells him that he is only accused of another theft prior to his crime. Sentenced to six months suspended prison sentence, he will also have to answer for the crime of the old lady.

Adaptation for TV of the Dino Buzzati play "Un caso clinico". A modern Kafkaesque horror story in which medical specialists and machinery destroy a perfectly healthy man.