A Christmas Tale

A CHRISTMAS TALE is a dazzling work of storytelling by acclaimed writer-director Arnaud Desplechin (KINGS AND QUEEN, MY SEX LIFE…OR HOW I GOT INTO AN ARGUMENT). Emotionally resonant and wickedly funny, the film stars screen legend Catherine Deneuve as the cool matriarch of a fascinatingly dysfunctional family and Mathieu Amalric (THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY, the upcoming James Bond film QUANTUM OF SOLACE) as her estranged, unstable son who returns home for the holidays. Energized by a dynamic visual style and terrific performances by an all-star cast, A CHRISTMAS TALE was featured in competition at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival.

Junon (Deneuve) and Abel (Jean-Paul Roussillon) are the parents of three grown children: Elizabeth (Anne Consigny, THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY) is a melancholic playwright with a mathematician husband (Hippolyte Girardot, KINGS AND QUEEN) and a tortured teenage son, Paul (Emile Berling); Henri (Amalric) is the self-destructive black sheep, banished from family events by Elizabeth five years prior; the youngest Ivan (Melvil Poupaud, BROKEN ENGLISH, TIME TO LEAVE), the peacemaker, is married to the beautiful Sylvia (Chiara Mastroianni, PERSEPOLIS, LOVE SONGS) and has two eccentric little boys; while a fourth – Joseph, the eldest – died from leukemia as a boy. When Junon is also diagnosed with leukemia, all are tested to see who can be a donor, and then the whole family – including lovesick cousin Simon (Laurent Capelluto) and Henri’s daft Jewish girlfriend, Faunia (Emmanuelle Devos, KINGS AND QUEEN, THE BEAT THAT MY HEART SKIPPED) – returns home for a long Christmas weekend. All crowded again under the same roof, solidarity quickly – and hilariously – devolves into feuding, drunkenness and bed-hopping, as everyone struggles to make sense of the mysteries of family, life, and what lies ahead.

Desplechin’s masterful narrative has the breadth of a sprawling novel and the nimble wordplay of a classic comedy, while packing the full sensory wallop of pure cinema. Achingly human and fiercely intelligent, A CHRISTMAS TALE proves yet again why Desplechin is among the most engagingly ambitious filmmakers of his time.

“It filled me with unadulterated joy.”

– A.O. Scott, The New York Times



“This is a film you don’t want to see end, not because the people are so happy, but because they are so human and so alive.”

– Kenneth Turan, The Los Angeles Times