I am an actress from the roots of my hair to the tips of my toes. I know exactly what it means to suffer for a character, to hate a character, to love a character. Although as an actress it’s completely different. You don’t suffer the same way the spectator suffers. When you suffer as an actress, you don’t suffer, you have pleasure. – Isabelle Huppert

French actress Isabelle Huppert’s résumé is remarkable. One of cinema’s most fearless actors, she has been constantly pushing away at the boundaries of her chosen art in the company of many of the world’s greatest directors ever since her screen debut back in 1971. Captivating audiences with her courage, intelligence and versatility, the sheer range of her roles and collaborators demonstrate an insatiable curiosity for what’s possible. Her ability to convey moral complexity in the most unique ways is just one of the things directors and audiences love about this remarkable actor. Her need for a challenge, that wonderlust spirit, and her refusal to be bland or to rely on easy charm mark her out as the outstanding French actor of her generation. We are certainly huge fans, above all for her willingness to consistently choose roles that are challenging and sometimes hard to watch, but with which we find ourselves unable to look away.

Throughout March, to celebrate the release of Elle (opening on Fri 10 March), we are screening four films featuring some of Huppert’s most memorable screen performances. Including her role as a mysterious postmistress in Claude Chabrol's unforgettable thriller La Ceremonie (Sun 5 March); Maria, the white plantation owner who stubbornly refuses to leave her business in the face of an escalating and brutal African civil war in Claire Denis’ White Material (Sun 12 March); as Erika Kahut in The Piano Teacher (Sun 19 March) - Michael Haneke’s penetrating examination of one woman's battle with desire, desperation and self-denial in what is perhaps the performance of her career; and her exquisite portrait of a fifty-something woman taking on mid-life misdirection in Mia Hansen-Løve’s poignant drama Things To Come (Sun 26 March).

---