A Self-Made HeroMovies like A Self-Made Hero
- Key Features:
- French history, Identity crisis, Historical revisionism, Moral ambiguity, Family secrets, Social commentary, Deception, Invention, World War II, Anti-hero, Political satire, National identity, Historical drama
- Tone:
- serious, satirical, ironic
- Target Audience:
- Arthouse cinema enthusiasts, Fans of historical dramas, Viewers interested in social commentary, Those who appreciate character studies
- Emotional Arc:
- Disillusionment → Self-discovery
A Self-Made Hero

Set in France at the end of World War II Albert Dehousse finds out his father wasn't a war hero and his mother is a collaborator.
A Self-Made Hero
Valentin D is a hot designer architect who claims to be an orphan because he is too ashamed to admit he is the son of working-class scrap metal merchants from the north of France.

Veronique, living with her divorced mother, is going on holiday to Mauritius with her father. To impress a local boy, Benjamin, she manages to complicate the situation by making up stories about her father. She presents him as her lover, a mercenary and even a secret agent which gets her into trouble and then her father has to start playing along...

In 1953, a sensitive French boy finds out from a neighbor that his family's Jewish. François Grimbert becomes a physician, and gradually peels the layers of his buried family history which resulted in his difficult upbringing, raised as Catholic by his "Aryan" appearing parents. His athletic father labored to stamp out stereotypical Jewish characteristics he perceived in his son, to keep the family's many secrets, as most relatives fought in World War II, and later were hauled off to labor and death camps by the Gestapo.

Louis is a super nice guy. But in his lawyer's office, this is not a compliment. When his doctor wrongly diagnoses a serious disease, his colleagues behaviour changes : they care about him, they ask him questions and they listen his answers. Finally, Louis exists ! So, obviously, he hesitates over telling the truth.

When Colonel Chabert returns from the war, he discovers that he has lost everything.

Burgundy, France. Solange's 60th birthday celebrations are violently interrupted by her estranged brother, Bernard. His outburst will reawaken painful memories and reveal untold stories of the Algerian War.

Pierre Gastié-Leroy is the son of a wealthy director of a factory of weapon manufacturing. Despite his parents, two generous uncles and a bishop godfather who try to inculcate him the rigid values of his social level, Pierre is a dreamer, antimilitaristic, social educator who dreams of saving three thugs, his "little guys" at the limit of delinquency. After several resounding failures that sent him to prison, Pierre is ordered by his father to join his factory to direct the social service. Tired of the venality of his father and the foolishness of the "little guys", Pierre hires them at the factory...

Set in France during the struggle for Algerian independence, Messaoud's mother is terminally ill and his father, needing to work long hours in the factory, can't look after him, so decides to put him and his older brother Abdel in foster care. Sent to the countryside, Abdel has to work on a farm, but Messaoud is taken in by a childless woman, who conceals his Arab origins from her fiercely Gaullist ex-army husband. Re-named Michel/Michou, and with his hair comically dyed blond, the young boy quickly steals the hearts of both foster-parents, and eventually is instrumental in saving their troubled marriage.

A son finds an escape from his turbulent marriage with his slightly dysfunctional and quirky parents who are hiding a young boy from the authorities.

François, a young thirty-year-old Asian, has not been back in his family for 10 years after a violent dispute with his father Meng. Since then, he has always tried to avoid questions about his origins, until he lies to believe that he has been adopted. But when he learns that he is going to be a father, he realizes that he will have to reconnect with his past and his origins. Pushed by his companion Sophie, he decides to reconnect with his family and returns to his XIIIth native district to announce the good news, accompanied by his best friend Bruno. François is welcomed with open arms by his family, with the exception of his father and his younger brother. The return to his community is not going to be so simple .

A woman has a close bond with her beloved Algeriann grandfather, who protected her from a toxic home life as a child; his death triggers a deep identity crisis as tensions between her extended family members escalate, revealing new depths of resentment and bitterness.

Agathe Clery, a marketing manager for a cosmetics company, is snobbish, stubborn and racist. When she is diagnosed with Addison Syndrome, an disorder that darkens the pigmentation of one's skin, she suddenly finds herself resembling a black woman.

A symphony in three movements. Things such as a Mediterranean cruise, numerous conversations, in numerous languages, between the passengers, almost all of whom are on holiday... Our Europe. At night, a sister and her younger brother have summoned their parents to appear before the court of their childhood. The children demand serious explanations of the themes of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. Our humanities. Visits to six sites of true or false myths: Egypt, Palestine, Odessa, Hellas, Naples and Barcelona.

Marie has had a tough childhood ever since her mother Elisa committed suicide. She has spent most of her life in an orphanage and now makes a living as a small time criminal in Paris. Now she wants to unravel her past and find her father whom she blames for her mother's death.

A celebrity journalist, juggling her busy career and personal life, has her life over-turned by a freak car accident.

How to become a man when your mother and your closed circle have decided otherwise? This is the challenge Guillaume took up. The film recounts Guillaume's tragicomic battle from the young age of eight, as he adopts the role of a girl then of a homosexual... until, aged 30, he meets the woman who, after his mother, will become the other woman in his life. Beyond this story of a heterosexual coming-out, the film tells the tale of an actor who never stopped loving women, maybe even a little too much.

During the events of May 1968 in France, different worldviews of conflicting relatives collide in their family estate.

France, World War II. In order to somehow make ends meet, the mother of two children, Marie Latour, does underground abortions and rents a room to a familiar prostitute. She doesn't pay any attention to her husband, who returned from the war because of his injury and lives her own life. Abortions gradually begin to bring a good income, and boredom can be easily dispelled by starting a young lover.

France, present day. A professional conman passes himself off as the boss of a construction site building a highway extension. He cons the whole region, hires dozens of workers and cynically enjoys the profits of his scam until he meets the lady mayor of a small village that the road will go through. She intrigues and unsettles him, before revealing to him a world he never knew: feelings. How far will he go now to save his victims and save himself from his own lies?

The Bouvier-Sauvages, a large aristocratic family, meet the much more modest Martin family when their children's wedding is announced. For the occasion, the future bride and groom offer their parents DNA tests, which will reveal their true origins. The results are totally unexpected and will make the effect of a bomb.

Telling the true story of Marvin Bijou, a young boy from a working-class family in a small village, who suffers constant bullying at school and home for being ‘different’ – too sensitive and too feminine. A chance encounter with a drama teacher opens the doors to a world that offers him the chance to escape his situation.

Abu, 14, is his father's pride. Unlike his three brothers, he is the "top of his class". Well, that's what he would have you believe. In truth, Abu is, above all, the king of lies and fake school grades. When the first meeting of parents and teachers arrives, he is going to stage the biggest lie of his life: he is looking for false teachers among his acquaintances in the neighborhood to meet his real father, while his real teachers will meet a false father.

Monsieur Papa is a moving portrait of a modern family, centering around 12 year-old Marius Vallois. Born in a wealthy family, Marius is the son of Marie Vallois, a successful CEO. Marie loves her son unconditionally, but Marius has never known his father and suffers greatly from it. When Marius starts shoplifting and doing badly at school, Marie decides to recruit a father figure for him. One day in her office building, she meets Robert Pique. Robert is a peculiar man who has a background in finance, but makes ends meet ironing clothes for his neighbors. Reluctant at first, Robert agrees to be paid to meet Marius and pretends to be his father. Marius immediately understands that Robert is not his dad, but very quickly, a deep bond develops between them.

The prodigal son of a family in turmoil returns home to his French rural home to reconnect with his family and make sense of their dysfunctions.

Molière, a down-and-out actor-cum-playwright up to his ears in debt. When the wealthy Jourdain offers to cover that debt so that Molière's theatrical talents might help Jourdain win the heart of a certain widowed marquise, hilarity ensues.

In France during World War II, a poor and illiterate man, Henri Fortin, is introduced to Victor Hugo's classic novel Les Misérables and begins to see parallels between the book and his own life.

It is 1943 in Paris. Like so many others, the Bourbelle family's home has been taken over by the Germans and they now live in their cellar. Little do they know that the son, Guy-Hubert Bourdelle, is far from being the cowardly hairdresser he pretends. He is in truth the Germans’ most feared opponent: le super-résistant!

Jérôme Varenne, a French financier, lives and works in Shanghai with Chen-Li, his life and business partner. One day, during a short stay in Paris, while paying a call to his mother, he is very displeased to learn from her and his hated brother, that the family house in Ambray is going to be sold. Jerome decides to go to the town where he grew up to see what is going on. Little does he know how eventful his escapade will be. Little does he know that it will change his life from soup to nuts...

In pre-WWII Holland, the penniless, illegitimate son of a powerful bailiff sets out to become a lawyer as he spends a lifetime struggling to prove his worth to his relentlessly spiteful father.

Lea and her husband Marc have known Francis and his wife Karine for a very long time. Over the years, each one of them has been assigned a specific role. The balance and dynamic of the group is blown up when Lea decides to write a novel, which turns into an immediate bestseller…

Paris, France, 1942, during the Nazi occupation. Robert Klein, a successful art dealer who benefits from the misfortunes of those who are ruthlessly persecuted, discovers by chance that there is another Robert Klein, apparently a Jewish man; someone with whom he could be mistakenly identified, something dangerous in such harsh times.

France, 1809. Captain Neuville is called to the front, leaving his future bride heartbroken. Her sister decides to write letters on his behalf to cheer her up.

Guillaume Canet is told by a young co-star that he's no longer Rock'n' Roll and can't sell films anymore. He then tries to prove her wrong and gets help from his girlfriend, Marion Cotillard.

A man spreads the rumor of his fake homosexuality with the aid of his neighbor, to prevent his imminent firing at his work.

A struggling actor seems doomed to live life as a loser. When he finally snatches a lead role as a superhero named “Badman,” he feels like everything is possible, but fate strikes again.

Nelie escaped a miserable existence by becoming a frontline nurse in 1914. One day, she takes the identity of Rose, a young woman from a good family, who dies in front of her. She presents herself in her place at Madame de Lengwil's house, to become the reader of this wealthy woman.

Village of Artigat, southern France, summer 1542, during the reign of Francis I. Martin Guerre and Bertrande de Rols marry. A few years later, accused of having committed a robbery, Martin suddenly disappears. When, almost a decade later, a man arrives in Artigat claiming to be Martin, the Guerre family recognizes him as such; but doubts soon arise about his true identity.

Jobless loner Eddie Vuibert gets a lucky break when a rich Jewish entrepreneur mistakes him for a Jew and gives him a sweet job in the Parisian fashion district.

Jerome, 35, is a yacht salesman in Nice. But if you listen to him, in his spare time Jerome is also an astronaut, a karate world champion and a close friend of Miss Universe. As a matter of fact Jerome is a compulsive liar: he lies to everyone about everything! No one believes him, but that doesn’t prevent him from accumulating more lies. But one day Jerome wakes up to find out that all his lies have come true... and it’s just the beginning of the troubles ...!

During a winter storm, Ursus offers shelter to two orphans, Gwynplaine and Déa; some years later, they are still living together. Gwynplaine has become a famous star, but his success threatens his relationships with Déa and Ursus.

A love story or a tale of the resistance, this poignant movie tells both the haunting story of a French resistance cell in Lyon but also the love of Lucie Aubrac for her husband...

Four separate stories deal with stereotypical ideas about Jews: their alleged influence on politics, the stereotype of Jewish business-mindedness, the Mossad, the Jewish world conspiracy and the memory of the Holocaust.

An upper middle-class French family celebrates a birthday in a restaurant. In one evening and during one meal, family history, tensions, collective and separate grudges, delights, and memories both clash and coalesce.

Silvio refuses to fight for the fascists and joins the resistance with Elena. After the war, his vitriolic newspaper articles cause him to be sentenced to imprisonment.

80-year-old Thomas recounts his childhood and middle age through a series of flashbacks and dream sequences. Thomas believes he’s been taken away from a better life at birth; following a hospital fire, he vividly recalls being swapped with another new-born, and subsequently grows up in a poorer neighbouring household.

The Arbac de Neuvilles are one of the oldest families in France. They have inhabited their ancient château for fifty-two generations and are proud of their noble ancestry. But today they are stone broke. When a bailiff turns up notifying them that they owe two million euros in back taxes, these proud aristocrats are understandably shaken to the core of their ancestral seat. Just how are they to find this amount of money when none of them has any capacity for work?

Clermont-Ferrand, central France. Médéric meets and falls in love with middle-aged sex worker Isadora, who is married. When the city center is the scene of a terrorist attack, Selim, a young, homeless guy, provokes a wave of paranoia by taking refuge in Médéric's building. Sympathizing with Selim, crazy about Isadora, Mederic's life suddenly turns into a mess.

1944. Léon Duchemin owns a restaurant with his sister. His clients are Germans, Résistance et black marketeers. Léon unwillingly joins the Résistance when a British pilot is shot down and hides in his attic and, through a series of mishaps, he accidentally steals the plans for Hitler's V1 missiles.

With gun-toting rivals on his tail, a daring bank robber takes refuge in the quiet residential street here he grew up and where his mother, Maniette, still lives. An unscrupulous property developer, Korazy, is buying up the neighborhood to turn it into a gleaming new banking district, but to her son's disgust Maniette leads the inhabitants resistance. Her ingenious methods provoke her boy's admiration, but he fights back with sneaky traps and underhand tricks when Maniette tries to force him to do the right thing just once in his life.

In Louis Malle's lauded drama, Lucien Lacombe is a young man living in rural France during World War II who seeks to join the French Resistance. When he is rejected due to his youth, the resentful Lucien allies himself with the Nazis and joins the Gallic arm of their Gestapo. Lucien grows to enjoy the power that comes with his position, but his life is complicated when he falls for France Horn, a beautiful young Jewish woman.

France, a factory worker, lives with her three daughters in Dunkirk. The factory where she worked has been closed, leaving France and all of her workmates without a job. She decides to go to Paris to look for work. There she finds a cleaning job at the home of a rich man, Steve, whose world is radically different from her own. As their paths keep crossing, she discovers that her employer played a part in closing the factory in Dunkirk...

When Pierre learns that his parents are not his parents, he wants to find out who he is and where he comes from. Raised in nature, Pierre has never been confronted with society. He does not know the codes. He will team up with Anna who will help him in his quest and cross a whole gallery of characters as funny as tender. But during his investigation, Pierre will lose his colors – like a photo that fades.

A drunken, self-destructive woman called Betty wanders into a Parisian bar where she meets middle-aged alcoholic Laure. Laure decides to take care of Betty. Recovering in a hotel room, Betty begins to recount to Laure the story of her bourgeois life and her unhappy and unfaithful marriage.

"Good son" Franck returns to his hometown to do a trainee managerial internship in the Human Resources department of the factory where his anxious, taciturn father has worked for 23 years.

Erwan, a strapping Breton who clears mines for a living, is shaken when he discovers that his father is not his father. Despite his affection for the man who raised him, he quietly sets out to find his biological father, and succeeds in locating Joseph, an endearing old codger he takes a liking to. Just when things look settled, another unexpected “bomb” hits Erwan in the form of Anna, an elusive nymph.

Rahim is in prison because of a debt he was unable to repay. During a two-day leave, he tries to convince his creditor to withdraw his complaint against the payment of part of the sum. But things don't go as planned. Is he truly a hero?

A French tradesman travels in time and liberates an oppressed tribe in another world.

This film originated as a play in Paris. The story focuses on the one-day adventures of Bertrand Barnier played with a genius of French cinema, Louis de Funes. In the same morning he learns that his daughter is pregnant, an employee stole a large amount of money from his company, his maid is about to resign in order to marry a wealthy neighbor and his body builder is interested in marrying his daughter. The seemingly complicated story-line is full of comedy or errors and some of the most hilarious mime scenes of the French cinema.

Unable to find her runaway son, a woman deceives two of her ex-lovers from her youth, a mild-mannered teacher and a tough journalist, that each is the real father in order to obtain their help.

Set in colonial French Indochina during the 1930s to 1950s, this is the story of Éliane Devries, a French plantation owner, and of her adopted Vietnamese daughter, Camille, set against the backdrop of the rising Vietnamese nationalist movement.

Gauthier, a young journalist, learns from his mother that he is the illegitimate son of Guy Jamet, a popular French singer whose heyday stretched unevenly from the 1960’s to the nineties. Guy is currently promoting a new album of old material and heads on tour. Armed with a camera, Gauthier decides to follow Guy, recording his daily routine and his concerts to create a documentary portrait.

An American spy behind the lines during WWII serves as a Nazi propagandist, a role he cannot escape in his future life as he can never reveal his real role in the war.

Gerard is tired of being taken for a good apple by his beautiful family. He leaves everything and starts a garage in a village nestled at the bottom of the Gâtinais ... In front of the garage, there is a lovely inn, run by Barbara: a beautiful woman, disconcerting, mysterious, unpredictable. Their encounter will spark ...

When Francois, a journalist, tours a big store for an article, he is chosen by the son of the newspaper's owner, Rambal-Cochet, as his new toy. Needing money and unwilling to quit his job, Francois agrees to this ridiculous assignment. Gradually befriending the spoiled boy, he induces him to play at making a newspaper, unveiling publicly the tyrannical way of life of the father. The powerful emotional climax we experience with the child astonishes both men.

Marco Lopez, a former Neo-Nazi and skinhead, tries to leave his violent, racist and hateful past behind him.

Judith leads a double life between Switzerland and France. On the one hand Abdel, with whom she is raising a little girl, on the other Melvil with whom she has two older boys. Little by little, this fragile balance, made up of lies, secrets and back and forth, cracks dangerously. Trapped, Judith chooses to head forward, at the risk of losing everything.

Alice, a perfect wife and mother, lives happily with her husband and child until the day she discovers he is living a double life that has ruined her financially and left her a single mother. Alice fights back and dives into a world beyond anything she has ever known.

Ariel, a young French Jew, decides to leave his family to go to Israel and secretly become an agent of Mossad, the Israeli secret service. After years of training, his first mission is in Paris to steal secrets from Remy Prieur, a French atomic scientist.

After World War II, a small French village struggles to put the war behind as the controlling Communist Party tries to flush out Petain loyalists. The local bar owner, a simple man who likes to write poetry, who only wants to be left alone to do his job, becomes a target for Communist harassment as they try and locate a particular loyalist, and he pushes back.

Housemaid Georgette loves to gossip and this causes major trouble to people around her.

François Marsault, a war veteran, makes the most of his retirement alongside his wife Annie. Authoritarian and ruthless, François rules his family with an iron fist — but when he discovers that his esteemed wife cheated on him 40 years ago, he files for divorce and confronts her former lover, who lives in the French Riviera.

France, 1789 - just before the Revolution. When talented chef Manceron is dismissed from his prestigious position by the Duke of Chamfort, he loses the taste for cooking. But when he meets the mysterious Louise, together they decide to create the very first restaurant in France.

To his chagrin, young Marcel Pagnol and his family move back to their home in Marseille, France, far from their pastoral holiday cottage in the hills. Determined, Marcel makes the long voyage back to the cottage on foot and lands himself in trouble. One day Marcel's father discovers a shortcut to the cottage, but it requires trespassing. Despite their trepidations, Marcel and his family begin using the secret trail to reach their cottage.

Genial, bumbling Monsieur Hulot loves his top-floor apartment in a grimy corner of the city, and cannot fathom why his sister's family has moved to the suburbs. Their house is an ultra-modern nightmare, which Hulot only visits for the sake of stealing away his rambunctious young nephew. Hulot's sister, however, wants to win him over to her new way of life, and conspires to set him up with a wife and job.

A middle-aged woman leaves her partner and drifts back to her ex-husband, while the lives of her middle class friends intersect with her own.

Bernie Laplante is having a rough time. He's divorced, his ex-wife hates him and has custody of their son, the cops are setting a trap for him, then to top it all, he loses a shoe whilst rescuing passengers of a crashed jet. Being a thief who is down on his luck, Bernie takes advantage of the crash, but then someone else claims credit for the rescue.

Léonard Monestier owns a large fortune, alas his wife Cynthia made a bad investment in a worthless oil concession. Far from letting this get him down, Léonard decides to find a sucker to buy this concession from him. Right on cue appears Antoine Brévin, a befuddled billionaire who is very interested in Léonard's beautiful daughter Patricia and would do anything to win her hand...

Pierre Renard is the blackboy of the writer George Vallier. At the time of a reception, the Italian actor Aldo Barazutti takes him for the writer and proposes to him to come to work with him in Tunisia with the development of a scenario. In fact Barazutti wants only to flee her wife to find her mistress Valerie. Misunderstandings when Vallier joined them. They must flee in the desert a jealous husband...

In order to make his little sick brother's dream come true, Leo and his best mates organize a fake score...but on the d day, they make a mistake and the fake score becomes a real hold up.Here starts the extraordinary adventure of PUBLIC Amis.

A captured French Resistance fighter during World War II engineers a daunting escape from prison.

After completing jail time for beating up a man who tried to seduce his mentally-handicapped teenage daughter, The Butcher wants to start life anew. He institutionalizes his daughter and moves to the Lille suburbs with his mistress, who promises him a new butcher shop. Learning that she lied, The Butcher returns to Paris to find his daughter.

Paris, 1933. The daughter of a respectable lower middle class couple, Violette Nozière, leads a disreputable double life. Far from being the innocent 18-year-old her parents mistake her for, she spends her nights with dissolute young men in the less salubrious areas of the city.

Bruno is released from prison. He looks for a job and tries to start a new life. His first stop is at his father's apartment.

Along with her husband and three children, Marthe lives in an eden of her own creation, nearly isolated from the rest of the world. The arrival of a construction vehicle, however, pierces their tranquil, hermetic existence—before long a disused highway has been re-opened, and the family finds their home situated in the midst of rush-hour traffic. While the privileges of clean air, quietude and privacy are thus denied them, Marthe remains determined to stay no matter the cost.

Victor, a disillusioned 60-something whose marriage is on the rocks, opts to relive the week of his life when, 40 years earlier, he met his true love through a company that allows customers to return to the time period of their choosing.

A young man meets his soon-to-be in-laws but discovers behind their proud and wealthy appearances some deep issues and lies.

A young filmmaker in 1960s Paris juggles directing a cheesy sci-fi debacle, directing his own personal art film, coping with his crumbling relationship with his girlfriend, and a new-found infatuation with the sci-fi film's starlet.

Sandra, a young woman forced to leave the south of France to flee a violent husband. Without attachment, she returned to Boulogne-sur-Mer, the city of her childhood which she left almost 15 years ago. She finds her mother there and a world she left behind. Without money, she is hired in a fish cannery where she befriends two workers. But one day, one of her colleagues tackles her insistently, she defends herself and kills him accidentally.

Bernand Fréderic is a mediocre bank executive. He's married and has a son. He used to have another profession: being French star Claude Francois. Now, with the Imitators Gala Night coming up, he must choose between his wife or the only thing that makes him happy: the applause.

An insurance agent and his new secretary become locked in the grip of romance and competition as they train together for a speed-typing contest.

Two years after a burn-out, Duval is still unemployed. Contacted by an enigmatic businessman, he is offered a simple and well-paid job: transcribing telephone tapping. Duval accepts financially without questioning the purpose of the organization that employs him. Precipitated at the heart of a political plot, he must face the brutal mechanics of the underground world of the secret services.

A steely special ops agent finds his morality put to the test when he infiltrates a crime syndicate and unexpectedly bonds with the boss' young son.

Alice Tomaso gets out of jail, and goes looking for Léo and Julien, one of whom, it appears, is her father. On the way, she steals the wrong car - one belonging to the Russian mafia, and arrives at her destination with a gang of thugs out looking for her and the car.

Aymeric runs into Florence, a former coworker, one evening in Saint-Claude in the Haut-Jura. She is six months pregnant and single. When she gives birth to Jim, Aymeric is there. They spend happy years together until Christophe, Jim's biological father, shows up... It could be the start of a melodrama, it's also the start of an odyssey into fatherhood.

A look at the sexual and professional lives of three people — a television director, his ex-girlfriend, and a sex worker.

Austrian farmer Franz Jägerstätter faces the threat of execution for refusing to fight for the Nazis during World War II.

JAM (Christian Clavier), a French "master of the universe" is on the brink of a major takeover when he starts suffering from anxiety attacks. His doctor (Lhermite) thinks it is to do with childhood experiences and suggests he searches back in his mind to something that could be the trigger and will prove to be the antidote.

A disgraced political journalist placed in the soccer section, Miss Pove is asked to follow the presidential campaign in progress. The front-runner is a fifty-year-old heir to a powerful French family and a political novice. Troubled by this candidate, whom she has known to be less smooth in the past, Miss Pove embarks on an investigation that is as surprising as it is jubilant.

