filmbriefs
Topic

Collecting

Accumulation with a taxonomy.

2
in film
13:00
average
26 min
in total
15
across the network
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13:00

La Collectionneuse

Éric Rohmer · 1967

Éric Rohmer’s 1967 La Collectionneuse, his first in colour and fourth of the Six Moral Tales, follows Adrien as he spends a summer at a villa near Saint-Tropez with friends and a younger woman named Haydée. Through restrained performances, natural-light cinematography by Néstor Almendros, and dialogue-driven scenes, the film traces subtle shifts in power, self-perception, and attraction — refusing resolution, explanation, or moral verdict. It won the Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize at Berlin and remains a benchmark of French arthouse precision.

13:00

Summer Hours

Olivier Assayas · 2008

Summer Hours follows three siblings negotiating the fate of their late mother’s country house and its art-filled contents. As they choose between preservation, sale, and donation to the Musée d'Orsay, the film traces how objects hold meaning only as long as they remain embedded in shared life — and how easily that meaning unravels across distance, time, and bureaucracy.

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13:00

20th Century Women

Mike Mills · 2016

Set in 1979 Santa Barbara, Mike Mills’ 20th Century Women follows 15-year-old Jamie as his single mother Dorothea enlists two younger women — photographer Abbie and teenage friend Julie — to help raise him. Anchored by Annette Bening’s restrained performance, the film observes their overlapping lives with warmth and precision, treating feminism, illness, ageing and adolescence as lived conditions rather than themes. Shot by Sean Porter and edited by Leslie Jones, it moves at the pace of real conversation, building meaning through accumulation rather than climax.

13:00

24 Frames

Abbas Kiarostami · 2017

Abbas Kiarostami’s final film, 24 Frames, comprises twenty-four uncut, static shots — each ninety seconds long — observing nature, animals, and thresholds between interior and exterior. Beginning with animated movement superimposed on Bruegel’s Hunters in the Snow, it proceeds into real-world stillness, testing how much meaning resides in time, attention, and unmediated presence. Released posthumously at Cannes 2017, it is a rigorous, unsentimental essay on perception and impermanence.

13:00

3:10 to Yuma

Delmer Daves · 1957

Delmer Daves’ 1957 Western 3:10 to Yuma adapts Elmore Leonard’s taut short story into a study of obligation under pressure. Rancher Dan Evans agrees to escort outlaw Ben Wade to the 3:10 train for Yuma, facing ambush, betrayal, and his own wavering resolve. Shot by Charles Lawton Jr. with sun-bleached realism and scored sparingly by George Duning, the film builds suspense through pacing, performance, and moral granularity — not spectacle. It was preserved by the Library of Congress in 2012 for its cultural and aesthetic significance.

13:00

3 Women

Robert Altman · 1977

Robert Altman’s 1977 film 3 Women follows the uncanny merging of identities among a timid young woman, her garrulous roommate and a silent, pregnant artist in a sun-scorched California town. Built from a dream and shot with deliberate, unhurried precision, it uses repetition, reflection and improvisation to explore how selves are borrowed, performed and abandoned.