French Film Highlights This April

Alpha is a 2025 body-horror drama film written and directed by Villa Albertine resident Julia Ducournau. It stars Tahar Rahim, Golshifteh Farahani, Mélissa Boros, Emma Mackey, Finnegan Oldfield, and Louai El Amrousy. The story follows a teenage girl who, after returning from school with a tattoo, is feared to have contracted a new lethal bloodborne disease.

The film had its world premiere in the main competition at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival on 19 May, where it was nominated for the Palme d’Or.

In 1936, as the British Empire tightens its grip on Palestine, Yusuf is caught between his village home and his work in Jerusalem. Amidst an anti-colonial revolt and Jewish refugees fleeing persecution from Europe, all sides converge in a decisive moment for the region. Palestine’s Official Selection for the 98th Academy Awards.

At the height of Stalin’s purges, an idealistic prosecutor investigating abuses by the secret police finds himself caught in a dangerous web of bureaucratic paranoia.

In 1955, 60-year-old Marcel Pagnol is a well-known and acclaimed playwright and filmmaker. When the editor-in-chief of ELLE magazine commissions a weekly column about Pagnol’s childhood, he sees this as a great opportunity to go back to his artistic roots: writing. Realizing his memory is failing him and deeply affected by the disappointing results of his last two plays, Pagnol starts doubting his ability to pursue his work. That is until Little Marcel – the young boy he used to be – appears to him as if by magic. Together, they will explore Marcel Pagnol’s incredible life and bring back to life his most cherished encounters and memories…

Jason Robards stars as a New York Jewish lawyer who returns to his hometown of Stuttgart after 55 years to find traces of his parents (including a doctor father who was proud of having fought for the Fatherland during WWI) and closest school friend, scion of one of Germany’s most notable families. Told mostly in flashback, REUNION centers on the two 16-year-old boys (Christien Anholt as the young Robards and Samuel West as his aristocratic friend) and their unlikely friendship, even as national socialism begins to insinuate itself into everyday life.

François Ozon reunites with Summer of 85 star Benjamin Voisin for a sensitive, queer-inflected adaptation of Albert Camus’s existential classic, bringing Algeria to the thematic and visual foreground. The film was nominated for four César Awards and won Best Supporting Actor for Pierre Lottin.

A magical and beautifully animated journey through time, Arco is a dazzling adventure about a 10-year-old boy from a peaceful, distant future who accidentally travels to the year 2075 and discovers a world in peril. As Arco develops a charming and touching friendship with a young girl named Iris, they band together—with her trusted robot caretaker Mikki—on a quest to get Arco home, while the two children may also be the only ones who can save the planet.

A wondrous odyssey filled with hope and optimism, Arco is an enchanting fable from breakout filmmaker Ugo Bienvenu, produced by Remembers’ Ugo Bienvenu and Felix de Givry, and mountainA’s Natalie Portman and Sophie Mas. The film debuted at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival and won The Cristal Award for Best Feature Film at the 2025 Annecy Awards.

Brazil, 1977. Marcelo, a technology expert in his early 40s, is on the run. He arrives in Recife during carnival week, hoping to reunite with his son but soon realizes that the city is far from being a non-violent refuge. The film premiered in the main competition at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival, where it garnered widespread acclaim and emerged as the festival’s most awarded film, earning Wagner Moura the Best Actor award and Mendonça Filho the Best Director award.

A father (Sergi López) and his son arrive at a rave deep in the mountains of southern Morocco. They are searching for Mar — daughter and sister — who vanished months ago at one of these endless, sleepless parties. Surrounded by electronic music and a raw, unfamiliar sense of freedom, they hand out her photo again and again. Hope is fading, but they push through and follow a group of ravers heading to one last party in the desert. As they venture deeper into the burning wilderness, the journey forces them to confront their own limits.

Sentimental Value follows sisters Nora and Agnes as they reunite with their estranged father, Gustav, a once-renowned film director, after the death of their mother. Hoping to stage a comeback and repair old wounds, Gustav offers stage actress Nora the lead role in his new, deeply personal film. When she refuses, he casts a young Hollywood star instead, forcing the sisters to confront their complicated loyalties, buried resentments, and the emotional cost of turning family history into art.

From April 8 – 19, New Directors/New Films takes over Film at Lincoln Center and MoMA with an ambitious lineup of contemporary French films, including New York and U.S. premieres, celebrated auteurs, and exciting new talents redefining French cinema today.

Highlights include 6 French coproductions, such as Agon by Giulio Bertelli, Do You Love Me by Lana Daher, Forest High (Forêt Ivre) by Manon Coubia, Kika by Alexe Poukine, Memory by Vladlena Sandu, Erupcja by Pete Ohs, as well as the short films with Marseille, 14 July by El Mahdi L Youbi, Taxi Moto by Gaël Kamilindi, and Only Angels (Seuls les anges) by Clément Pinteaux.

The Princeton French Film Festival returns for its particularly ambitious fourth edition, running from March 20 to April 23, 2026, with a lineup celebrating French and Francophone cinema through over 20 films—from timeless classics to U.S. premieres—alongside 14 Q&As, masterclasses, exhibitions, and a literary festival. It features thematic focuses like animation, ecology, diaspora, and comedy, screening across Princeton University campus, the Public Library, Garden Theater, and Arts Council venues in original languages with English subtitles. Highlights include the 4K restoration of The Umbrellas of Cherbourg with a post-screening Q&A, and closing with Michel Ocelot’s Dilili in Paris followed by Q&A with the prestigious filmmaker.

Maison Française at Columbia University will host screenings of two French productions:

• Four Daughters by Kaouther Ben Hania (The Man Who Sold His Skin) which uses an audacious formal conceit to tell the story of Olfa Hamrouni and her four daughters. Attempting to answer the question of how and why the Tunisian woman’s two eldest were radicalized, Ben Hania reveals a complex history. We watch as the family relives key events in their lives with help from professional actors standing in for the missing girls. Winner of the Best Documentary award at the Cannes Film Festival, Best Documentary Feature at the Gotham Awards, and Best Writing at the IDA Documentary Awards, Four Daughters is a compelling portrait of five women and a unique and ambitious work of nonfiction cinema that pushes against the conventional boundaries of the documentary form to explore the nature of memory, rebellion, and the ties that bind mothers and daughters.
• Ziyara by Simone Bitton. In Arabic, Ziyara (زيارة) means visit to the saints. Celebrated filmmaker Simone Bitton embarks on a personal road trip across Morocco, tracing the remnants of the country’s once-thriving Jewish community. In the 1950s, Morocco was home to 300,000 Jews; today, only a small fraction remain, yet their saints’ tombs endure—cared for by Muslim guardians who preserve their memory. Through close examination of synagogues, shrines, and village records, Bitton uncovers stories of coexistence, loss, and endurance. Ziyara is both a meditation on migration and a hopeful reflection on shared heritage, revealing a delicate thread between past and present, tradition and modernity. As the camera gathers stories, smiles, and blessings, it patiently repairs connections long thought severed.

L’Alliance New York celebrates French director Sophie Letourneur with a retrospective of her films at the Florence Gould Theater (55 E 59th St). On April 21, 2026, L’Aventura (108 min, 2025)—her latest film chronicling a chaotic family road trip via voice notes—screens at 4pm and 7pm in original version with English subtitles, featuring a Q&A with Sophie Letourneur. Other highlights like Les Coquillettes and Voyages en Italie round out this focus on her autofictional, humorous style blending intimate fiction and daily life chronicles.

Focus on French Cinema spotlights three films that capture the emotional depth and formal diversity of contemporary French filmmaking :

– The Residence (Dalloway) on April 12, directed by Yann Gozlan, is a near‑future thriller about novelist Clarissa Katsef, who retreats to a high‑tech artist residency in the middle of a health crisis, only to find her creative process manipulated by an ever‑present AI assistant named Dalloway. As the boundaries between reality, fiction, and surveillance blur, the film turns into a tense psychological portrait of writing, control, and digital intimacy. Completing this strand of human–machine unease is

– D’un monde à l’autre, available on April 13, an intimate documentary‑style journey in which actor Jérémie Renier, grieving the accidental death of his best friend, embarks on an Arctic expedition with explorer Loury Lag. Across hostile ice floes and silent landscapes, the film becomes a contemplative meditation on mourning, rebirth, and the fragile bonds that keep us “alive again” after loss.

– In deliberate contrast, The Rose Maker on April 17 brings warmth and humor to the program: Pierre Pinaud’s buoyant comedy follows Catherine Frot as Ève Vernet, a once‑celebrated rose grower facing bankruptcy, who hires three inexperienced workers and devises a daring plan—to create a prize‑winning hybrid rose and pull off a gentle “heist” to secure the parent plants she needs.

At Anthology Film Archives, the series Metaphysics of the Pratfall: Jerry Lewis and Jean-Luc Godard brings into dialogue two seemingly disparate yet deeply intertwined figures of modern cinema. Pairing films by Jerry Lewis and Jean-Luc Godard, the program explores their shared commitment to pushing the boundaries of cinematic form. Conceived as a tribute to their unexpected affinities, the series highlights how both artists transformed cinema into a laboratory for invention, blurring the lines between entertainment and avant-garde practice.

Discover the Francophone Short Films in Harlem, an iconic festival celebrating short films from the Francophone world right in New York City. Founded by Lucie Chabrol-Nyssens, it showcases emerging talents from Belgium, Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Canada, France, and beyond, featuring immersive screenings followed by engaging Q&A sessions. Mark your calendars for the 10th edition from April 24 to 29, 2026: at Maysles Documentary Center (April 25 to 27), Maison Française Columbia (April 29), and Lycée Français NYC (April 30).

Each year, ReelAbilities highlights powerful stories that center the lives, perspectives, and experiences of people with disabilities across communities and cultures. From April 23–30, 2026, we will present groundbreaking films, riveting conversations, and opportunities for meaningful engagement and action, in venues throughout the Greater NYC area.

As part of the upcoming festival, the festival will be presenting a film that explores themes related to parenting and disability with My everything directed by Anne-Sophie Bailly. 

SYNOPSIS
A tender and quietly gripping portrait of devotion, boundaries, and change. Mona has organized her entire world around caring for her adult son, Joël, who has an intellectual disability. When Joël’s partner unexpectedly becomes pregnant, Mona is forced to confront a future she never imagined—and a role beyond her control. Equal parts empathy and restraint, the film chronicles a family at an unforeseen crossroads, navigating love, autonomy, and the difficult process of letting go.

Film at Lincoln Center presents the first-ever U.S. theatrical release of Maurice Pialat’s La maison des bois, marking the world premiere of its luminous 4K restoration from Janus Films, accompanied by three essential Pialat features each approaching, from a distinct vantage point, the fixations that shape the director’s epic work.

Discover our roundup of this month’s must-see programs available on the international French-language network, TV5 Monde.

Villa Albertine and Unifrance are pleased to unveil the 2026 Young French Cinema selection, featuring six acclaimed French films still awaiting U.S. distribution. From intimate auteur stories to socially engaged dramas, these bold new works spotlight the most exciting voices in contemporary French cinema, with women directors behind five of the six films. Available à la carte, the program invites art-house theaters, festivals, universities, and cultural organizations nationwide to bring today’s best French films to their audiences.