Catherine Breillat’s Closet Picks 

Such a formidable and expressive guest.

This fine lady surely must be one of the most engaging, interesting, expressive and generous of all guests to appear in the closet. Listening to her speak is almost akin to hearing poetry. Most guests to the closet bring something of value whilst others just try to big note themselves. Some are outright pretentious. Then you get the small number whom just shove dvds in their bag without sharing anything with the viewers. To take the time to speak with sincerity for the benefit of others is something only the best closet visitors share. What a delight this one was in particular. She moved me more than some films do.

She talks about cinema so poetically. This was really beautiful to listen to. 🥹

This was the most "French film director in the Criterion Closet" ever!! LOL!! It's nice that they gave her a chair and pulled her films beforehand. You know she has stories that you could listen to for hours!

One of the best Criterion Closet videos in a long time. I like Breillat's films. I like her choices of films. This particular "guest" truly understands and appreciates cinema. She makes me almost want to fall in love with her enthusiasm, passion and knowledge. Now I want to go and revisit her films. Please, Criterion, some more.

The old generation of film markers is full of amaxing intelligent and truly deep people. People who really have something interesting to say. Please bring morecofvthem whilecthey still alive.

This woman's films altered my perception of cinema, entirely. A Ma Soeur, Sex is Comedy, and Une Vielle Maitresse are some of my absolute favorites. Bless her. 🖤💐

"I think it's better to watch a masterpiece 100 times than to watch a film once that distracts you but has no use [...] An essential film transports you to another dimension." She so eloquently revealed to me why I fell in love with film. Original movies with stories to tell will sink into my bones and live there for years, while the usual churn from the Hollywood machine sloughs off my skin the day after I see it.

This was like a mini masterclass. Beautiful words from a great filmmaker.

"Cinema is also something that welcomes you into a family." I love that!

I’m glad we finally met somebody that everybody likes you

I absolutely love when she picked up black Orpheus and she spoke about childhood & distractions.

Love her novels and films. An incredible talent. Lucky to have seen 36 Fillette in 35mm last year

Incredible woman. In this new barbaric world she is one of the great directors still with us. Thank you Criterion for inviting her. She makes so many directors today look trivial.

This is a lady who can really disturb you with rawness and human isolation but bring you back with that human desire for connection. "Romance" and "Anatomy of Hell"...just wow! Have to see them again sometime.

She is an absolute legend of French cinema! Could listen to her stories all day. As others have said, indeed like a mini masterclass! ❤

Did not think I would see Breillat on here. Inspired.

I miss living in Europe so much. It’s so much more intellectual on a daily basis/level with human interactions, and more familiar to me, as someone who went from living in the former USSR to the US’s south (well, DC, which has “northern manners and southern intelligence” 😂

One of the best closet vids ever.

We need more Imamura releases ("The Eel").

I absolutely adore her

I get a real sense just from watching this that Catherine burns inside like a supernova. Her passion, her vision, her focus seems inextinguishable. P.S. Shamefully I've never seen any of her films, but I'm just about to put that right.

Damn, this is one of my absolute favorite Closet videos now. The way she talks about cinema being a family, and the importance of recognizing and knowing yourself was very very powerful. And her accent is divine.

Would love a Criterion Box Set of Breillat’s films. So many are trapped on DVD, deserve 4K. She’s obviously from the old school of cinema, still working from what I’ve read. A true master of female driven cinema.

Cave of treasures. That’s exactly the definition of the Criterion closet.

Silvia Pinal was the face you identified with in Viridiana! What a face! and a great actress to boot!

I really love her movie choices like Viridiana.

One of world cinema's most courageous writer directors. I've seen as much of her work as I could get my hands on.

It’s like listening to a novel you don’t want to end

Oh my God I love her!

Im not sure if it is Andrei Rublev that is the feature where parts of the shooting was lost for Tarkovsky but i seem to recall that Stalker required him to do reshots as some of the footage had been destroyed. Either way thanks for Braillet in the closet.

Breillat's "Fat Girl" (2001) is in the Criterion Collection. I wish her "Romance" (1999) were too. Both films are poetic, beautiful, and shocking.

Fabulous hair!

Catherine is brilliant

A truly inspiring and thought-provoking visit to the Criterion closet, in a manner only Breillat could accomplish.

What wisdom this woman radiates! 👏

Je suis heureux que nous ayons enfin quelqu'un que tout le monde t'aime

This is something you get at a master class and here's free for all of us. Catherine the Great

Best one yet!

" Vengeance is mine " is a masterpiece.

Wonderful commentary, great choices

Queen.

I love her and her films

Merci beaucoup madame!

mal wieder sehr viel dazu gelernt

Best guest yet?

I love Viridiana too

Can't argue with that.

please release 36 fillette

Superb🌲

wonderful

did she cite a movie with Rocco Siffredi? kudos to both

What is she referring to when she says she was considered a pariah in France at one time?

Vengeance is Mine is Imamura’s masterpiece just as she rightly noted that Andrei Rublev is Tarkovsky’s.

Delightful, warm, brilliant, elegant woman who chose her films without an "agenda". Very moving.

this es great!

Why the French language always sounds so beautiful and sensual?. Especially if it is spoken by a woman..

Please post the interview with Greta Gerwig, it's been months and most people haven't been able to see it 😢

Everyone here is praising Catherine, assumedly not knowing her beyond the films she’s made. She denounced Asia Argento for opening about her abuse from Harvey Weinstein, saying Asia made these comments because she feels bitter she didn’t become more famous than she is calling her ‘a mercenary and a traitor’. Caroline Ducey also alleges that Breillat made her do un-simulated sex scenes without informing her before that it wasn’t going to be faked. She admits that she didn’t ask Delphine Zentout’s age before filming 36 Fillette, as had she been a few days younger it would’ve been illegal to screen the movie, as it involved nude scenes and she had just turned 16 at the time. Disgusting stuff

Aguante Silvia Pinal (Viridiana) !!!

Yup. She's French.

💜

Fat girl was horrifying. Easily one of the scariest movies I have seen.

😊😊😊😊great

❤

My wife

I loved Trois hommes et un Couffin. But why did they have to ruin it with an American remake?

Ça serait très cool de à choisir un cinéphile normale, comme par exemple moi, d’entrer le Criterion Closet et faire un vidéo comme ça.

Christ, so incisive and beautiful.

Can please someone stop the lynch background noise?

Subtitles??? Can't you do a dubbed version? Also, I prefer pan & scan version to this "widescreen" nonsense you are doing. And finally, please throw in some explosions or superheroes shooting light beams out of their hands because this is SO BORING. She hasn't even directed ONE Marvel movie? Waste of time!

Is every movie she makes about sex? She seems to have a one track mind. Maybe pick a new subject.

😜😀😆

Based on her films, im surprised she didnt take in the realm of the senses or something

well, that bergman collection is 250 quid, so you know... you should have invented a much better reason to snatch it lady!

Yikes. I knew she had a stroke but I didn't realize how debilitating it was. Her left arm looks immobile.

It's very out of character for me to say something like this about an artist, but I find Breillat to be one of the most insufferably pretentious & talentless directors alive. MA SOEUR is a film student's imitation of _Nouveau Vague_ and ROMANCE and ANATOMY OF HELL feel like expensive film school projects: self-indulgent, navel-gazing pontification with vapid resolution. I don't doubt her sincerity & conviction, but the only film of hers I've seen worth watching is SEX IS COMEDY--i.e. a film about herding cats instead of locquacious pondering on the existential mythology of genitalia.

Ehhh a lot of her stuff seems pretty sleazy