200-205 Fantastique: The Dreams and Nightmares of French Cinema
Posted: Wed Jul 08, 2026 10:04 am
Though rarely thought of as a home for genre filmmaking, France has fostered a long lineage of films treading the line between realism and fantasy. Broadly gathered under the term cinéma fantastique, these works often find the magical and the surreal lurking in the ordinary. Uncanny dreams, fleeting visions, or eerie apparitions lift their protagonists out of the everyday, transporting viewers into atmospheric worlds where the usual rules structuring our reality do not appear to hold. Formally striking and thematically stimulating, these phantasmagorical films blur the boundary between horror and wonder as they weave beguiling tales around the mysterious and the unexplained.
DANS LA NUIT
Shortly after his wedding, a quarry worker (Charles Vanel, The Wages of Fear, Illustrious Corpses) is disfigured in a mining accident. The creepy mask now covering his face is scarier than the scars underneath it… and his bride (Sandra Milovanoff) is soon tempted by the promise of happier days with another man. The sole feature film directed by legendary French actor Charles Vanel, Dans la nuit was released at the dawn of the sound era and virtually condemned to obscurity as a result. This restoration reveals a viscerally affecting story of love and happiness, terror and guilt, with stunning cinematography and breathtakingly creative editing capturing the surreal atmosphere of life in the mines as well as the dizzying joy of romance.
LA NUIT FANTASTIQUE
Philosophy student Denis (Fernand Gravey, La ronde) makes ends meet by working nights at a fresh food market. Perpetually exhausted, he often falls asleep and dreams of Irène (Micheline Presle, Donkey Skin), a beautiful woman dressed in white. One night, he follows her on a peculiar adventure across Paris… One of the most successful French films made during the German occupation of France, Marcel L’Herbier’s lighthearted comedy uses ethereal set design, witty dialogue, and a charismatic cast to gracefully skip from one charmingly implausible moment to the next. Suspending your disbelief is easy when dream logic makes for such a lovely tale.
LE DIABLE SOUFFLE
One rainy night in the city, Laurent (Charles Vanel, The Wages of Fear, Illustrious Corpses) meets Louvaine (Héléna Bossis), a sickly and despairing young woman. He brings her back to his small island near the Spanish border, where the Tramontana wind always blows. One stormy night, Diégo (Jean Chevrier), a mysterious drifter, finds refuge on the island, disturbing Laurent and Louvaine’s harmonious routine. Emotions are high and imaginations run wild in Edmond T. Gréville’s moody story of unrequited love, broken dreams, and frustrated desires. The atmospheric cinematography by Henri Alekan (Beauty and the Beast, Wings of Desire) captures all the hallucinogenic power of the film’s unusual setting, an isolated place battered by winds and rain when it isn’t bathed in idyllic sunshine.
THE GOLEM
After he mistakenly swaps his hat with that of somebody called Athanase Pernath, an unnamed man (André Reybaz) appears to start living the stranger’s life in his dreams. A jewel cutter and book restorer in the Prague ghetto, Pernath is embroiled in his neighbors' sordid stories of passion, jealousy, and revenge, while rumors spread that an ominous clay figure known as the Golem has reappeared after 33 years. Jean Kerchbron’s TV adaptation of Gustav Meyrink’s novel, itself inspired by the Jewish folktale of the Golem, seems like an emanation from another time and place. Mystical dialogue, arresting set design, and a panoply of striking faces combine in a hypnotic, metaphysical tale that appears to abide by old rules and ancient wisdom.
THE WOMAN WITH RED BOOTS
After Françoise (Catherine Deneuve, Belle de Jour, Mississippi Mermaid), a successful novelist, meets the rich art patron Pérou (Fernando Rey, Illustrious Corpses, That Obscure Object of Desire), he begins to stalk her. Soon, he invites her to write her memoir at his country house. But he also invites Marc (Adalberto Maria Merli, The Night Caller), the director of an art magazine whom Françoise has become obsessed with. Juan Luis Buñuel takes after his father in this unpredictable allegory on art’s power to control us and warp our perceptions. The multi-layered game of cat and mouse makes canny use of Deneuve’s on-screen persona as both an unreachable ideal and a sensual, flesh-and-blood woman: Françoise is an artist who, through her creative imagination and the grip she has on men’s psyche, can make them see things that may or may not be there.
THREE LIVES AND ONLY ONE DEATH
In the first of four intertwining tales, Marcello Mastroianni (8 ½, Le notti bianche) plays an affable man who tells a stranger about the time fairies devoured years of his life. In the second, he is a Professor who abandons his job to become a beggar. In the third, he is the eccentric butler that comes with the large chateau a young couple unexpectedly inherits. And in the fourth, he is a businessman who learns that the family he invented to get out of work obligations is arriving from the airport. Chilean filmmaker Raúl Ruiz tells four strange yet eerily familiar, fable-like tales set in Paris, where he lived and worked for much of his life. Mastroianni’s twinkle-eyed charm carries us through an offbeat journey through time and destiny, made up of odd coincidences, weird recurrences, and bizarre details.
BLU-RAY LIMITED EDITION BOX SET SPECIAL FEATURES:
4K restorations of Dans la nuit, La nuit fantastique, Le Diable souffle, The Golem, The Woman with Red Boots and 2K restoration of Three Lives and Only One Death presented on six discs
Uncompressed mono PCM audio for each film
New introduction to Dans la nuit by Institut Lumière director Thierry Frémaux
New commentary on Dans la nuit by film historian Pamela Hutchinson
New interview with French cinema expert Ginette Vincendeau on La Nuit fantastique and French cinema under the Occupation
Archival TV interview with director Marcel L’Herbier on La Nuit fantastique
New commentary for Le Diable souffle by film critics Elena and Manuela Lazic
New interview on Le Diable souffle and director Edmond T. Gréville with film critic David Thompson
New interview with Kim Newman on The Golem and Gustav Meyrink’s novel
Archival TV introduction to The Golem by journalist and writer Louis Pauwels
The Golem photo gallery
French, Italian, and English audio options for The Woman with Red Boots
New interview with fashion expert Matteo Augello on The Woman with Red Boots
New visual essay on The Woman with Red Boots by critic and author Samm Deighan
Archival interview with Catherine Deneuve on The Woman with Red Boots
New commentary on Three Lives and Only One Death by Adrian Martin
Archival TV interview with Marcello and Chiara Mastroianni on Three Lives and Only One Death
New documentary on the French cinéma fantastique then and now, featuring directors Lucile Hadžihalilović, Bertrand Mandico, Yann Gonzalez, and more to be confirmed
Newly improved English subtitle translation for each film
Reversible sleeves featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Time Tomorrow
Limited edition 120-page book featuring new writing by Virgine Sélavy and David Cairns, as well as archival writing by Tzetan Todorov, André Bazin, Henri Alekan and more
Limited Edition of 5,000 copies presented in a rigid box with full-height Scanavo cases for each film and removable OBI strip leaving packaging free of certificates and markings
Year: 1930 - 1996
Format: Blu-ray
Region: AB
RAD200BDLE
UPC: 760137222453
Release date: 10/20/26
UK/US release