Belgian movies

Belgian cinema lifted off during the 1990s, gaining international prominence with such films as “C’est arrive près de chez vous” (Man Bites Dog) with Benoît Poelvoorde a well-known Belgian actor. It’s a darkly comedic 1992 Belgian crime mockumentary. In the film, a crew of filmmakers follows a serial killer, recording his horrific crimes for a documentary they are producing. 

 

Le huitième jour (The Eighth Day) is a Belgian film of 1996 that tells the story of the friendship that develops between two men who meet by chance. Harry (Daniel Auteuil), a divorced businessman who feels alienated from his children, meets Georges (Pascal Duquenne), an institutionalised man with Down's syndrome, after Georges has escaped from his mental institution and is nearly run over by Harry. The film was written and directed by Jaco Van Dormael. This film was nominated for the Palme d'Or award, the top prize at the 1996 Cannes Film Festival. It did win the Best Actor award at the festival, which was given to both Pascal Duquenne and Daniel Auteuil. This was the first time in the festival's history that two actors had shared the award. The film was also nominated for a César Award and a Golden Globe award.

Rosetta is a 1999 French-Belgian film written and directed by Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne. It is about a seventeen year old girl (played by Émilie Dequenne) who lives in a trailer park with her alcoholic mother. Trying to survive and to escape her situation, she attempts to find and hold a job that will allow her to move out of the caravan and away from her mother.Rosetta won the Palme d'Or and the Best Actress awards at the 1999 Cannes Film Festival. In Belgium the film inspired a new law prohibiting employers from paying teen workers less than the minimum wage. 

 

Les Barons (The Barons) live by the philosophy that each person is given a certain number of footsteps in their lifetime, and once they're all taken you're gone. Hassan, Aziz and Mounir are three friends who lead a life of pleasant apathy. The theory which postulates that the fewer steps one takes in a lifetime, the richer and more satisfying one's interior life. But, as is so often the case, when real life crashes unpleasantly into their dream world, Hassan, Aziz and Mounir are forced to deal with life, love and the future.