Today marks the start of the Avignon Film Festival, celebrating European and American independent cinema. Screenings will be held at Cinéma Vox through June 29. Regular admission is €6, but pick up a promotional postcard at the box office to get five screenings at €2 per film. All shows are open to the public.
Though Quentin Tarantino did win the prix tournage for Reservoir Dogs in 1992, don’t expect too many famous faces. Founder Jerome Rudes describes the festival as “an event where we discover movies, not where we see a movie that’s going to be seen [in theaters] the next day or the next week.”
For a schedule, visit the Avignon Film Festival website or stop by the Cinéma Vox box office, 25 Place de l’Horloge.
Provençal culture is deeply connected to the earth and there is no better way to experience the land than to seek out the current harvest. Many of the regions most historic villages come to life in the summer with traditional festivals celebrating the local crops. Complete with parades, horses, and cowboys, Provence’s summer festivals offer a delicious taste of the region’s proud agricultural heritage.
Wherever you go in Provence these days, you’ll be sure to find cherries. Crates at the markets are overflowing with the little red berries and cafes are serving the fruit in every possible form of cake, pie, and clafoutis. The warm rays of the Mediterranean sun fill the berries to bursting and its hard not to finish a tasting without lips and fingers as red as the houses of Roussillon.
Cherry fever will reach its peak this Sunday, June 1st, with harvest festivals held throughout the region.
If you’re in the Aix-Marseille area, visit the festival at La Roque d’Antheron. This small village about 25 km west of Aix en Provence is home to a 12th Century Abbey and has spectacular views of the Lubéron hills.
Closer to Avignon, La Confrerie de La Cérise (The Brotherhood of the Cherry) will host a festival in the tiny village of Venasque in the foothills of Mont Ventoux. Classified as one of Les Plus Beaux Villages de France, this little town of 900 residents is located 11km east of Carpentras.
Useful French:
a cherry: une cérise
napkin: une serviette
The spirit of revolution is alive and well in France this spring. Forty years after the massive student uprisings of May 1968, France is poised for large scale protests in the coming weeks.
Fisherman have blocked access to ports throughout the country in recent days asking for tax breaks due to the rising cost of diesel fuel. Yesterday, the workers at the port of Marseille went on strike to protest the privatisation of loading activities at state-run ports. Marseille is a popular cruise ship destination as well as a ferry terminal serving Corsica, Sardinia, Algeria, and Tunisia. Travellers planning to arrive or depart by ship in the coming weeks should contact their travel agent or the Marseille Port Authority for the latest updates.
Rail service, Air France, and public transport unions are expected to strike tomorrow (May 22) protesting against a planned change in the minimum age for collecting full pension. The minimum age is currently 40, but the government, arguing that increasing life expectancy requires people work longer, plans to extend the minimum age to 41. Civil servants are expected to join in the strike in opposition to a planned cut in 58,000 jobs over the next two years. Rail unions are threatening an open-ended strike as of June 2. Some trains will be running tomorrow. Visit the French Rail Network’s website for information about specific routes.
On May 24, teachers and students are expected to protest the government’s plans to cut over 11,000 education jobs in the coming academic year. The students and teachers have been vocal in the streets over the last two months, with ever-growing numbers of participation. A national one-day teachers’ strike was held last week with hundreds of thousands of participants. The May 24 strike is expected to be of equal magnitude.