Skip to Main Content

University Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

French and Francophone Studies: Film Studies

Databases--all are UIUC

Find Books

Image result for film camera

To locate books on French-language cinema, search the online catalog using the following subject headings.

For French Cinema:

Motion pictures--France--History--19th Century

Motion pictures--Franch--History--20th Century

Motion pictures--Dictionaries--French

Motion picture producers and directors--France--Biography

For Francophone Cinema:

Motion pictures--Africa, French-speaking

Motion pictures--Africa--History

Motion pictures--Africa, North

Motion pictures--Africa, Sub-Saharan 

Motion pictures--Arab countries

For Canadian Cinema:

Motion pictures--Quebec (Province)

Motion pictures--Canada

Cinéma--Canada

For Literature and Cinema:

Film adaptations

French literature--Film adaptations

Motion picture plays--History and criticism

Motion pictures and literature--France

French literature--Film and video adaptations

Motion picture plays. French

Film Reviews

Film Reviews

VideoHound's world cinema: the adventurer's guide to movie watching. Detroit, MI: Visible Ink Press, c1999. xix, 551 p. with illustrations.

Reviews of over 800 films produced outside of the U.S. in the last 100 years, including films from Europe, the Middle East, and Canada. Entries are arranged alphabetically by the English title of the films. There are also sidebars on numerous directors and actors as well as indexes by master titles, countries of origin, cast, directors, writers, cinematographers, composers, and categories.

Allan, Elkan, ed. A Guide to world cinema: covering 7,200 films of 1950-84 including capsule reviews and stills from the programmes of the National Film Theatre, London. London: Whittet Books in association with the British Film Institute; Detroit, MI : Distributed in North America by Gale Research Co., 1985. v, 682 p. with illustrations.

Entries are presented in alphabetical order by film title. French and other non-English film titles are given in English translation. Includes an index of directors.

Movie Review Query Engine

This search engine allows searching for film reviews by movie title, keyword(s) from the title, or category (such as recent releases and winners of specific film festivals).

FilmCritic.com

Over 7,000 detailed English-language reviews of films from around the world.

Watch Films Online

Film streaming for students and professors provides online access to over 16,000 films including French-language cinema.  

Find DVDs

French and Francophone films are available on DVD and may be checked out from the Undergraduate Media Collection.  Search the online catalog using the following subject headings.

For French Films:

Feature films--France

Documentary films--France

For African Films:

Feature films--Africa

Documentary films--African

For Canadian Films:

Feature films--Canadian

Feature films--Québec (Province)

Documentary films--Canadian

(In the VuFind catalog narrow search results by format.)

Cinema Vocabulary

Vocabulary

Journot, Marie-Thérèse.  Le vocabulaire du cinéma.  Paris: Nathan, 2002.  125 p.

This handy little dictionary includes over 500 entries on terminology used by film specialists.  Entries include examples and cross-references.  Also provided is a bibliography of other film dictionaries and of general works on cinema.

Montvalon, Christine de. Les mots du cinéma. Français retrouvé. Paris: Belin, c1987. 511 p. with illustrations.

From "A (film)" (meaning A-list movie) to "Zorro", this French-language dictionary includes entries on popular expressions from the movies as well as technical cinematographic terms. Informative and entertaining.