Fifty years ago, the Cannes film festival collapsed as filmmakers withdrew their work in a wave of protest. We’ve compiled a selection of films slated to play at the canceled festival, as well as a new introduction by film historian Dudley Andrew.
Directed by Carlos Saura • 1967 • Spain
Carlos Saura's PEPPERMINT FRAPPE was made in the mid-1960s, when Franco's fascist regime was still ruling Spain, and the movie is very much an allegory about its own era -- a rigidly conservative middle-aged man finds himself hopelessly enamored of his bes...
Directed by Jan Němec • 1966 • Czechoslovakia
In Jan Němec's surreal fable, a picnic is rudely transformed into a lesson in political hierarchy when a handful of mysterious authority figures show up. This allegory about oppression and conformity was banned in its home country but became an inter...
Directed by Miloš Forman • 1967 • Czechoslovakia
A milestone of the Czech New Wave, Miloš Forman’s first color film THE FIREMEN’S BALL is both a dazzling comedy and a provocative political satire. A hilarious saga of good intentions confounded, the story chronicles a firemen’s ball where nothi...
