Time to Play: Films by Jacques Rozier

One of the most original, self-assured, yet undersung voices of the French New Wave, Jacques Rozier crafted across a career spanning five decades a cinema attuned to the beauty and heartbreak of chance encounters, improvised days and spontaneous play. This box set presents the UK Blu-ray premiere of his five feature films and several of his short films across five discs.

In Adieu Philippine (1962), two girls and a young man spend an idyllic few days in Corsica, his upcoming military service in Algeria looming on the horizon. Also abandoning Paris for the seaside, three girlfriends enjoy a languorous late summer break in Near Orouët (1971). A promised Robinson Crusoe experience in the Caribbean turns into something much more chaotic in The Castaways of Turtle Island (1976). Maine-Ocean Express (1986) follows strangers on a wild adventure across the language barrier. In the backstage comedy Fifi Martingale (2001), a superstitious theatre director makes catastrophic changes to a successful play.