Released this week, Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi’s new film, “Les Amandiers”, was particularly well received by the French press, since its average is 4.1/5.
Not far from four years after Les Estivants, Valeria Bruni Tedeschi delivers Les Amandiers, her seventh feature film as a director. A powerful film about youth in the 1980s, taking place in the prestigious Ecole des Amandiers de Nanterre created by Pierre Romans and Patrice Chéreau (in which the filmmaker herself made her debut and notably rubbed shoulders with Agnès Jaoui, Vincent Perez, Marianne Denicourt and Bernard Nissille).
WHAT IS IT ABOUT ?
At the end of the 1980s, Stella, Etienne, Adèle and the whole troupe were twenty years old. They pass the entrance examination for the famous school created by Patrice Chéreau and Pierre Romans at the Amandiers theater in Nanterre. Launched at full speed in life, passion, games, love, together they will live the turning point of their lives but also their first great tragedies.
The Almond Trees by Valeria Bruni Tedeschi
With Nadia Tereszkiewicz, Sofiane Bennacer, Louis Garrel…
WHAT THE PRESS SAY:
According to Bande à part:
“The very agile direction of Valeria Bruni Tedeschi manages to weave the theater and the existence of each one in a permanent back and forth, where the tragedy and the lightness are the short scale. That this film is alive!” (Anne-Claire Cieutat) 5/5
According to Les Inrockuptibles:
“Because Les Amandiers acts like a time machine, which would have changed into a particle accelerator and would make us experience all the feelings, all the states in two hours of projection – a stunning, electrifying experience with tingles under the skin .” (Marilou Duponchel) 5/5
According to The Obs:
“Valeria Bruni Tedeschi puts her guts and those of her actors on the table, seeks the paroxysm all the time and finds it wisely. She also ensures with the choice of her superb actors (…).” (Sophie Grassin) 4/5
According to La Voix du Nord:
“There is tragedy and romance in these Amandiers which no doubt celebrate a bygone way of teaching an art of interpretation distantly related to the New York Actor’s Studio. When the appetite for acting equals that of live.” (Christophe Caron) 4/5
According to Le Figaro:
“No need to have walked the boards with Chéreau in the 1980s, or even to have a passion for the theater, to be touched by this group portrait.” (Etienne Sorin) 4/5
According to Marie Claire:
“A twirling chronicle of youth in the 80s. A pure concentrate of emotions.” (Emily Barnett) 4/5
According to Le Monde:
“The apprentice actors play together, also love each other, argue, devour each other, make love… We don’t enter Les Amandiers like in any other school. Not to be missed.” (Maroussia Dubreuil) 4/5
According to Les Echos:
“A moving initiation which offers the director the opportunity to sign her best film.” (Olivier de Bruyn) 4/5
According to First:
“But what turns out to be the most exciting in this teeming puzzle where we shout, we cry, we kiss, we hate and we adore each other, always pushing the sliders to the bottom, is the reflection on the way of to be an actor, to live this job definitely not like the others.” (Thierry Cheze) 4/5
According to Critikat.com:
“The film gradually breaks with its limited conception of the theatre: acting no longer consists only in stripping oneself completely and radically, but in registering oneself in a memory of actions and gestures.” (Josue Morel) 3/5