Little Film Club: Beau Travail

The next BRLSI film club in conjunction with The Little Theatre is French director Claire Denis’s critically acclaimed 1996 Beau Travail  (Good Work).

Now regarded as a classic, the film is loosely based on Herman Melville’s novella Billy Budd with parts of the soundtrack taken from Benjamin Britten’s 1951 opera of the same name. Set in the towns and deserts of Djibouti, Africa this visually stunning film examines the intense relationships between the men of the French Foreign Legion in the dying days of the French empire. Friendships and loyalties are tested against a background of martial discipline and shimmering, simmering African desert.

The film club is a chaired discussion group and follows the same format as our popular BRLSI Big Read.

Emma Ingledew, Manager, The Little Theatre Cinema

Things to think about whilst watching!

1. Claire Denis described her film as a grafting together of different texts. Can you think of any other tales centering on masculinity that may have influenced this film?

2. Beau Travail was released in 1999. In the past twenty years has there been a cultural reimagining on how we view masculinity?

3. Described by McGill as “a near-ballet of a film that’s at least as much a work of choreography as of verbal storytelling’. How does the music and dance of the film impact the story for you?

4. Do you think the story being told by a female director and a female cinematographer influences the perspective of the film?

5. How did you interpret the ending of the film? Should films have definite endings or be left up for interpretation?

This session is FREE to members of BRLSI and Little Theatre – please register in the booking section below to receive your ticket and instructions for watching online.

Non-members £3.00.

If you would like to watch Beau Travail at The Little Theatre on Friday 23 June, the day before the discussion, please follow this link to the Little Theatre website.

If you are a BRLSI member and would like 25% off a new Little Theatre membership, take a look at our latest News item!

And if you are a Little Theatre member you can come to BRLSI talks and get 25% off non-member tickets – please email us at reception@brlsi.org for more details.