European Films

Javier Cámara in Nacho G. Velilla's 'Fuera de carta' (Chef's Special). Photo by José Haro, (c) Antena 3 Films.

Comedies can be subdivided into all sorts of niches, including straightforward romantic comedies (Ensemble c'est tout / Hunting and Gathering), gay comedies (20 centímetros / 20 Centimetres, Reinas / Queens) and cooking comedies (Eden, Bella Martha / Mostly Martha). But rarely, if ever, have these three elements been brought together -- at least, not until Nacho G. Velilla's Fuera de carta (Chef's Special). The romantic gay cooking comedy premiered in Spain on Friday and walked away with the Audience Award and a Best Actor Award at the Málaga Film Festival on Saturday.

'Flammen & Citronen' (Flame & Citron). Photo (c): Nimbus Film Productions / The Match Factory.

That WWII still has many untold stories to tell can be gleaned from films as diverse as the recent Austrian Oscar-winner Die Fälscher (The Counterfeiters), about an enormous German counterfeiting operation set up concentration camp labour; the French biographical drama Un secret (A Secret), about a man's illusions about his parents' idyllic past, and the Dutch Oscar-shortlisted Zwartboek (Black Book), about the infinite shades of gray in the Dutch resistance movement. A new film from Denmark, Ole Christian Madsen's Flammen & Citronen (Flame & Citron), can now be added to the list. The film concentrates on a WWII resistance movement that became increasingly more questionable as some of its members became more ruthless. Flammen & Citronen stars local chameleon Thure Lindhardt and Casino Royale bad guy Mads Mikkelsen as the titular resistance fighters and premiered in Denmark on Friday.

A shot from 'Astérix aux Jeux Olympiques'. Photo (c): Pathé Distribution.

Without a doubt one of the largest European roll-outs for a European film has started today with the French premiere of Astérix aux Jeux Olympiques (Asterix at the Olympic Games), the third live-action film in the Astérix series. Released on almost a fifth of all French screens today, the film directed by Thomas Langmann and Frédéric Forestier is one of the most expensive in French history with a production budget of €78 million and another €20 million just for its local marketing. The new Astérix has already been playing in Poland since February 25 and will also be released today in Belgium, Greece and Russia. Germany, Hungary, Slovakia, Finland, Norway, Latvia and the UK follow later this week, while people in Italy, Spain, Sweden and Iceland and the Netherlands will have to wait for an early February release.