In 1967, French icon Catherine Deneuve starred in a sensational drama called Belle de Jour, about a housewife who, although disinterested in sex with her husband, takes on a day job as a prostitute. Thirty-eight years later, actor Michel Piccoli reprised his role from that film for a sinister 2006 sequel/homage from director Manoel de Oliveira called Belle Toujours. Tonight, as part of its Festival of Films in French, the UWM Union

The UWM Union Theatre’s ongoing 2008 Festival of Films in French isn’t all glamorous shots of gorgeous people strolling through scenic Paris. Wesh, Wesh, What’s Going On?, screens at 7 p.m., and Samia, at 9 p.m.,

The UWM Union Theatre’s ongoing 2008 Festival of Films in French isn’t all glamorous shots of gorgeous people strolling through scenic Paris. Many of the selections take a look at the country’s bleaker side. For instance, Wesh, Wesh, What’s Going On?, a 2005 drama that screens at 7 p.m., follows an immigrant family living . . .

The UWM Union Theatre’s ongoing Festival of Films in French may be heavy on new films, but it has also found room in its line-up for some classic ones. Tonight, for instance, the theatre hosts a free 7 p.m. screening of Jean-Luc Godard’s classic 1965 drama Pierrot le fou.

Filmed through a video camera carried around by participants in the catastrophe it depicts, Cloverfield has drawn understandable comparisons to The Blair Witch Project. But where the earlier movie was an interesting experiment, Cloverfield works as a full-blown feature film. Where Blair Witch meandered . . .

More and more children are faced with parents lingering on in the dimming half-life of dementia. Unable to care for themselves or sometimes even remember who they are, the parents are a burden, a flashpoint of guilt, an opportunity for unselfish love. The problem is compounded when the parent is . . .

French may be the language of love, but tonight, it’s also the language of choice for scorned lovers. Gabrielle, the 2006 Patrice Chereau film screening at 7 p.m. tonight in the UWM Union Theatre as part of its Festival of Films in French, depicts the tumultuous dissolution of a loveless marriage. Based on Joseph . . .

Sergei Parajanov was less interested in telling stories than plunging the viewer into the world, the consciousness, of his protagonists. The Soviet Armenian director paid a high price for the persistence of his vision. Hounded by censors and jailed repeatedly, Parajanov managed nonetheless to complete nearly a dozen films before his death in 1990. The international acclaim he earned on the film festival circuit in the 1960s and ’70s prevented the Communist authorities from doing their worst.

Let’s face it: Unless you have the time and disposable income to fly to film festivals around the world, it can be difficult to see all the selections that the Academy nominates for their short-film category. Thankfully, the Oscar Nominated Short Films program, which screens at the Times Cinema through Feb. 28, with . . .