Jean de Florette

In the mid-20s, hunchback tax collector Jean Cadoret inherits a farm in Provence. The map shows a valuable spring on his land, but his neighbours, the cunning Soubeyrans, have stopped it up. For a while Jean de Florette and its sequel, Manon des sources, were the most successful foreign films in British box-office history, and deservedly so. A two-part adaptation of Marcel Pagnol’s novel l’Eau des Collines, these films are, quite simply, a tour de force.

Double bill with Manon des Sources: £12, conc. £10