Bird PeopleMovies like Bird People
- Key Features:
- Existentialism, Transformation, Identity crisis, Surrealism, Paris, Airport, Hotel, Interconnected stories, Metamorphosis, Isolation, Human connection, Fantasy, Dreams
- Tone:
- restrained, poetic
- Target Audience:
- Film festival enthusiasts, Art house aficionados, Contemplative viewers, Fans of surreal narratives
- Emotional Arc:
- Intrigue → Confusion → Wonder
Bird People

An overstressed American businessman and a French chambermaid make a connection at an airport hotel in Paris.
Bird People
At Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, a beautician on her way to a new job in Mexico accidentally meets a cook who is on his way back from America. Labor strikes, bad weather, and pure luck cause the two of them to share a room overnight at the airport Hilton hotel. Will their initial mutual indifference and downright hostility turn into a one night stand or perhaps something more?

An inspirational speaker becomes reinvigorated after meeting a lively woman who shakes up his mundane existence.

As she does every morning, Lucie takes advantage of her journey to work to lose herself for a while in the pages of a good book. And as she does every morning, she joins her colleagues at the office with a smile. It's a working day just like any other. Then suddenly all activity in the office stops. All attention is turned towards the window of the opposite building opposite and abanner reading: Man Alone. Is it a hoax? A cry for help? Everyone has his own interpretation, and will try, by any means possible, to discover what lies behind this mysterious message.

Frustrated by the lack of intimacy in her relationship, a young schoolteacher goes through a series of intimidating and often violent sexual partners.

An Eastern European tourist unexpectedly finds himself stranded in JFK airport, and must take up temporary residence there.

Wada, a salary man, is enlisted to venture off to China to investigate a potential Jade mine. After his arrival, Wada encounters a violent, yet sentimental, yakuza, who takes the liberty of joining his adventure through China. Led on their long and disastrous journey to the mine by Shen, the three men come across something even more magical and enticing.

Improbable encounters bring tenderness, laughter and compassion to a world of urban alienation.

A quintet of cabbies in five cities and their remarkable fares on the same eventful night.

In a Paris hotel room, Jack Whitman lies on a bed. His phone rings; it's a woman on her way to see him, a surprise. She arrives and the complications of their relationship emerge in bits and pieces. Will they make love? Is their relationship over? (A prequel to The Darjeeling Limited, 2007.)

Corporate downsizing expert Ryan Bingham spends his life in planes, airports, and hotels, but just as he’s about to reach a milestone of ten million frequent flyer miles, he meets a woman who causes him to rethink his transient life.

An experienced airline pilot, Estelle leads a perfect life between long-haul flights with her loving, protective husband Guillaume. One day, by chance, in an airport corridor, she crosses paths with Ana, a photographer with whom she had a passionate affair twenty years earlier. Little does Estelle know that this reunion will send her into a nightmarish spiral, turning her life upside down and irrational.

Two young men are seriously affected by the Vietnam War. One of them has always been obsessed with birds - but now believes he really is a bird, and has been sent to a mental hospital. Can his friend help him pull through?

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

Two enigmatic women, Leni and Viva, separately arrive in Paris, each with a hidden but shared motive. As they navigate the city and their search progresses, various characters become entangled in their conflict, one which increasingly comes to take a fantastical turn. These characters too, driven by their own desires, strive to assert their influence in the struggle. In Paris, drenched in an otherworldly ambiance, an opaque tale of desire and power emerges through mystery and secrets.

An employee at the French Embassy in Bangkok invites his wife to join him – and enjoy the benefits of their open marriage.

A nameless drifter navigates a barren landscape punctuated by satellite dishes, radio towers and droning airplanes. Stopping periodically in anonymous hotel rooms, she makes attempts to connect to an unidentified second party.

In Paris, six people all look for love, despite typically having their romantic aspirations dashed at every turn.

A woman taking a cab ride from JFK airport engages in a conversation with the driver about the important relationships in their lives.

An American man unwittingly gets involved with werewolves who have developed a serum allowing them to transform at will.

In the aftermath of a car crash, a man discovers his dreams are tied to a stranger's sleepwalking.

Failed musician Jay abandoned his family and now earns a living as head bartender in a trendy London pub. Every Wednesday afternoon, a woman comes to his house for graphic, almost wordless, sex. One day, Jay follows her and learns about her. This eventually disrupts their relationship.

Jin-a, a young prostitute, moves into a seaside motel called the Birdcage Inn, run by a dysfunctional family. Struggling with her circumstances and the family's treatment, she forms an unlikely bond with the daughter, Hye-mi. As they navigate love, betrayal, and personal growth, their friendship ultimately leads to a deeper understanding and a chance for redemption.

Four tales, each centered on a woman, journey inward to explore the enigmatic reality of their lives, connecting through a single narrative thread.

Mory, a cowherd, and Anta, a university student, try to make money in order to go to Paris and leave their boring past behind.

After a love affair ends badly, a young Parisian named Paul sinks into the same kind of deep depression that led his sister to kill herself. He moves back home with his father and aimless brother Jonathan but refuses to get out of bed.

In London, an airport baggage handler is forced by French and British intelligence agents to seduce the wife of a businessman with ties to Syrian terrorists.

Isa and Marie bond while working in a French sweatshop and soon begin sharing an apartment that Marie is watching for a hospitalized mother and daughter. Marie, hoping to avoid a life of struggle and poverty, takes up with Chriss, a nightclub owner whose most attractive asset is his money. Isa recognizes the ultimate futility of the relationship and tries to keep Marie away from him, but her interference puts their friendship at risk.

We follow 24 hours in the life of a being moving from life to life like a cold and solitary assassin moving from hit to hit. In each of these interwoven lives, the being possesses an entirely distinct identity: sometimes a man, sometimes a woman, sometimes youthful, sometimes old. By turns murderer, beggar, company chairman, monstrous creature, worker, family man.

After a sexist joke goes viral, Cédric loses his job and embarks on a therapeutic journey to free himself from sexism and misogyny. He and his girlfriend hire a mysterious and liberated babysitter to help shake things up.

It's a story of 29-year-old top-manager Max who is really sure he is absolutely successful. All his life is around earning and spending money. But one day he meet a girl who is from another, real, world. And his own world starts to crash down.

A beautiful woman, Sandra, seduces a wealthy businessman, Miles Rennburg. Little does he realise that she has been sent to kill him at the behest of her boyfriend/crime partner, Lester. Controlling all this is Sue, Lester's wife.

Vincent is a famous successful entrepreneur. One day, a car breakdown on a mountain road temporarily interrupts his frantic lifestyle. Pierre, who lives apart from the modern world in the middle of sublime nature, comes to his aid and offers him his hospitality. The meeting between these two men, who are opposites will upset their respective beliefs and they will find themselves laughing. The question is...deep down, are they really each living the lives they want to live?

The story revolves around Alain, a busy businessman who is always in a rush. In his life, there is no room for spare time or family. But one day, he suffers a stroke, which makes him lose his grasp of language and use one word in place of another.

A man awakens from a coma, only to discover that someone has taken on his identity and that no one, (not even his wife), believes him. With the help of a young woman, he sets out to prove who he is.

18-year-old Lina arrives in Paris for her studies. She comes to look for what she has never found in Lebanon, her country of origin: a certain form of freedom. The survival instinct as the only baggage, she sails from one Paris to another to the rhythm of her romantic encounters.

Passengers on a low cost flight from Djerba to Beauvais have their patience tested to destruction when their departure is delayed for eight hours because of a fault with the plane's air-conditioning. In the end, they are so fed up that they will do almost anything to get back home.

Vincent, a young Parisian uncomfortable with his appearance, installs a brain chip named Reality+ which allows users to see themselves and fellow users with their dream body. However, Reality+ only works over 12-hour intervals, proving infuriating for Vincent as he falls for Stella, another user.

Jacques, a young man with artistic aspirations, spends four nights wandering Paris with a young woman, whom he rescued from suicide.

A bourgeois office drone whose raison d'être is the music of French rocker Johnny Hallyday awakens one day in an alternate universe where the famed musician never recorded a single song. When he’s not at the office dutifully plugging-away, Fabrice lives a deadly dull life.

Two co-workers, one a vain woman and the other an awkward teenager, share an increasingly bizarre relationship after becoming roommates.

A maths teacher acquires the power to travel into movies to save the woman of his dreams and bring her back to her correct film.

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.

A street vendor with a grim home-life forges a connection with a young woman on her way to Paris.

A man wanders out of the desert not knowing who he is. His brother finds him, and helps to pull his memory back of the life he led before he walked out on his family and disappeared four years earlier.

The intersecting lives of teens on a surfing trip, a woman with a weak heart and two teams of doctors and medical experts.

A regular guy struggles with a repressive home and professional life, as well as making amends for the trouble his free-spirited brother and sister cause about town.

The idea is simple / A married woman and a single man meet / They love, they argue, fists fly / A dog strays between town and country / The seasons pass / The man and woman meet again / The dog finds itself between them / The other is in one, / the one is in the other / and they are three / The former husband shatters everything / A second film begins: / the same as the first, / and yet not / From the human race we pass to metaphor / This ends in barking / and a baby's cries / In the meantime, we will have seen people talking of the demise of the dollar, of truth in mathematics and of the death of a robin." - JLG

Marion and Jack try to rekindle their relationship with a visit to Paris, home of Marion's parents — and several of her ex-boyfriends.

Samba migrated to France 10 years ago from Senegal, and has since been plugging away at various lowly jobs. Alice is a senior executive who has recently undergone a burnout. Both struggle to get out of their dead-end lives. Samba's willing to do whatever it takes to get working papers, while Alice tries to get her life back on track until fate draws them together.

A man confronts his past during an experiment that attempts to find a solution to the problems of a post-apocalyptic world caused by a world war.

One morning, Lily and Ben wake up side by side in bodies that are not theirs. And Magalie, a little girl in the body of a tall, bearded, awaits them in the guest room. This is the beginning of an incredible adventure, sometimes initiatory, where the bodies and identities will be reversed at the option of a simple hug.

Stéphane lives a quiet life as an eminent French Chef but when he decides to visit Soo, a mysterious Korean lady he fell in love with on Instagram, he'll embark on an adventurous journey full of discoveries.

Husband does not understand his wife? Conflict with children? Do you want to be heard and stood in your place? Be afraid of your desires. In this family, everything changed places, including grandmother.

A supposedly idyllic weekend trip to the countryside turns into a never-ending nightmare of traffic jams, revolution, cannibalism and murder as French bourgeois society starts to collapse under the weight of its own consumer preoccupations.

A recent college graduate flees to Paris after a break-up, where his involvement with a prostitute begins to reveal a potentially dark recent past.

A young woman moves to Paris and has a brush with disaster. Grown-up at last, an accomplished woman thought she was safe from her own past. Gradually, these characters come together to form a single heroine.

While traveling, Emmanuelle meets Kei, a man who constantly eludes her. Though she indulges in the many alluring distractions, she can’t shake their chance encounter. Will she submit to her basest desires to forge a deeper relationship?

On election night in 1981, celebrations spill out onto the street and there is an air of hope and change throughout Paris. But for Elisabeth, her marriage is coming to an end and she will now have to support herself and her two teenage children. She finds work at a late-night radio show and encounters a troubled teenager named Talulah whom she invites into her home.

Théo and Hugo meet in a club and form an immediate bond. Once the desire and elation of this first moment has passed, the two young men, now sober, wander through the empty streets of nocturnal Paris, having to confront the love they sense blossoming between them.

Three people and a baby set off on separate journeys, along the same road; their disparate dreams and stories intertwine amidst the breathtaking deserted Patagonic route.

Jeanne, a shy young woman, works as a night guard at an amusement park and has a close relationship with her mother. While no man can compete with this opposed duo, Jeanne begins to develop strange romantic feelings for Jumbo, the latest attraction at the theme park...

After answering an ad on a dating website for Eastern European women, Olla leaves Ukraine and heads to French suburbia to move in with Pierre, who lives with his elderly mother. However, the suburbia cannot temper her desires, and nothing goes as expected.

A story of Naoufel, a young man who is in love with Gabrielle. In another part of town, a severed hand escapes from a dissection lab, determined to find its body again.

Arthur is invited to a New Year's Eve party to celebrate the year 2000. His girlfriend Lucie would like a baby from him but he refuses. Through the ceiling of the toilets, he discovers a passage leading to this futurist Paris. There, he meets an old man Ako who affirms he is his son and that he wants to exist. Otherwise he will vanish into the air. Arthur is still hesitant because his life is an unfulfilled one: a has a little lucrative job, is uncertain about his future and things are getting out of hand when Ako discovers the passage and interferes in the party.

Tragedy strikes a married couple vacationing in the Moroccan desert, which jumpstarts an interlocking story involving four different families.

Helene, a pill-addicted anesthesiologist, is mourning the death of her boyfriend when, through a car accident she causes, she chances to meet the lethargic Gilles, a young man who lives for free at his mother's hotel. Gilles pursues Helene romantically, and she eventually softens up. Gilles, however, is also devoted to Bernard, a petty crook who revels in mugging gay men. All three struggle with relationships that seem to be going nowhere.

20-year-old Margaux makes the acquaintance of 45-year-old Margaux: they have a lot in common – so much so that it turns out they are one and the same person, at two different ages and stages of their life…

Murphy is an American living in Paris who enters a highly sexually and emotionally charged relationship with the unstable Electra. Unaware of the seismic effect it will have on their relationship, they invite their pretty neighbor into their bed.

A man planning to commit suicide hires a taxi driver to take him to his jumping-off point.

The story of Henry, a stand-up comedian with a fierce sense of humour and Ann, a singer of international renown. In the spotlight, they are the perfect couple, healthy, happy, and glamourous. The birth of their first child, Annette, a mysterious girl with an exceptional destiny, will change their lives.

Michel Berthier, a senior executive at a mattress manufacturing company, has just been fired. As he does not dare to tell the truth to Juliette, his partner, he goes into debt to maintain the family’s standard of living, showering them with gifts. But soon he can no longer lie, and he decides to leave the house. After losing his money, his car, and his shoes, he meets Toubib, Mimosa, and Crayon, three “homeless” people who wash themselves in the restrooms at the Gare de l’Est. They take him under their wing and lead him to break into his former company in order to get sleeping bags and beds.

After a bad breakup, a college-aged Parisian moves into her father's flat only to discover that he is living with his new girlfriend - a young woman her age.

A man entranced by his dreams and imagination is lovestruck with a French woman and feels he can show her his world.

Paul, a young idealist trying to figure out what he wants to do with his life, takes a job interviewing people for a marketing research firm. He moves in with aspiring pop singer Madeleine. Paul, however, is disillusioned by the growing commercialism in society, while Madeleine just wants to be successful. The story is told in a series of 15 unrelated vignettes.

Louise, a widow with two children, almost crushes a stranger with her car. She takes care of him, even if he's not really wounded. It turns out that he has mental disorders and that they can help each other much more than they thought.

Marguerite loses her wallet, and it's found by Georges, a seemingly happy head of family. As he looks through the wallet and examines the photos of Marguerite, he finds he's fascinated with her and her life, and soon his curiosity about her becomes an obsession.

Tokyo, Japan, 1989. Lucy Fly, a foreigner who works as a translator, begins a passionate relationship with Teiji, a mysterious man obsessed with photography.

Ana is confronted with body and desire at three key moments of her life. As a young girl, she brings her dead grandpa back to life. In her puberty, she discovers the power of decay and sexuality. Finally, she wrestles with loss and loneliness when she returns to her parental home, now derelict.

Sam, a freelance journalist, decides to investigate the growing phenomenon of disaffected youth joining extremist groups. He infiltrates a group of four young people who have been tasked with the creation of a jihadist cell and whose mission is to destabilise the city centre of Paris.

A story about 11 girls living in Paris. Each of them has its own problems: career, love life, children. Every girl has their complexes and virtues. They always look elegant, hiding their inner feelings. Will they reach all the goals and overcome all their difficulties?

An American writer living in exile in London, Philip listens to women. His English mistress, who visits him regularly in the studio that serves as their refuge. A student he loved in another life. A former lover confined to a hospital in New York.

A French woman mourning over the death of her husband three years prior is courted by a Swedish co-worker.

Four guys from a Paris housing project fabricate a documentary about drug dealers working in the City of Lights. When a television network falls hook, line, and sinker for the prank video, the foursome are given a free three-week vacation in the upscale resort community of Biarritz. As they interact with both locals and fellow tourists, they learn about love, friendship, racism, and the differences between the rich and the poor.

Two introverted people find out by pure chance that they share the same dream every night. They are puzzled, incredulous, a bit frightened. As they hesitantly accept this strange coincidence, they try to recreate in broad daylight what happens in their dream.

A restless photographer leaves her family to "find herself" and takes up deep-sea diving.

He invents puzzles. He’s committed body and soul to his work and needs silence to be able to concentrate. She is an accomplished pianist and can’t live without music. She must prepare for a competition that could change her life. They are going to be forced to coexist without seeing each other.

In a world where an AI programme allows people to communicate with their deceased loved ones, a flight attendant and a mother question the meaning of reality and humanity.

At a Greek hotel in the off-season, a chambermaid, a man obsessed with BMW cars, and a photo-store clerk attempt to film and photograph various badly re-enacted struggles between a man and a woman.

Follows a variety of New York characters as they navigate personal relationships and unexpected problems over the course of one day.

A professional cellist has an encounter with a stranger on the subway which has unexpected and far-reaching ramifications on his life.

Emile Chenal and his wife, Françoise, leaned on boxing manager Jim Fox Warner to cough up the considerable sum of money that he owes them, with both the police and the mob circling the situation. In the same hotel, Inspector Neveu looks into a murder that took place years before, and his storyline overlaps with the arc of the Chenals.

An acclaimed novelist struggles to write an analysis of love in one of three stories, each set in a different city, that detail the beginning, middle and end of a relationship.

A seemingly simple taxi ride across Paris evolves into a profound meditation on the realities of the driver, whose personal life is in shambles, and his fare, an elderly woman whose warmth belies her shocking past.

Selma, a psychoanalyst, deals with a cast of colorful new patients after returning home to Tunisia to open a practice.

In Paris at night, a young aspiring filmmaker grapples with heartbreak after his girlfriend leaves him for his best friend. After a failed attempt to confront his friend, he wanders the streets and encounters a girl who has just been abandoned. Their paths cross at a party, bringing together two tormented souls.




