Sophie Daumier

55 years ago, on October 1 1968, the first brand advertising spot appeared on the French television screen. Over the next three decades, thousands of creative little films would seduce and build our collective memory. Kitschy or cult spots, humor, slogans, music, stars, gimmicks, grand spectacle or sex appeal: during its golden age, how did advertising convince? Thierry Ardisson has brought together almost 400 advertising clips to relive the era of the conquest of minds and wallets.

During her holiday in Brest, a young Parisian falls in love with a sailor. But autumn comes and the two lovers have to part. They write to each other. Will their love resist at a distance, each living his life, him in Brest with his friends, she in Paris who keeps waiting for him? An impossible love story and the cross-portrait of two cities, Paris and Brest, between the realism of the color images and the poetry infused by the sepia black and white images, lives to the rhythm of the nostalgia of the two lovers...

Near the end of the Civil War, an imprisoned Confederate raider is sent under guard to warn both his men and the Army at Fort Yuma that an impending rebel raid is really nothing but a ruse by scoundrels from both sides, in cahoots to take the fort's gold for themselves during the chaos. Soon he slips his treacherous escort and attempts to complete the mission himself.

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.

Paul Martin is the subservient brown-nosing youngster who needs quick advancement up the hierarchy to pay for the modern lifestyle he is buying on credit. Seeing that marrying his immediate superior's daughter will not get him the results he wants, he begins plotting the demise of the head of the company. The company itself specializes in holiday travel and unscrupulously brutalizes its customers for maximum profit, spending more thought on publicity gimmicks than customer service...

French film favorite Edwige Feuillere plays a high-class gangster's moll named Maine. When Maine's first husband and daughter pay a visit, it's an awkward time for our heroine and her current amour, gang boss Godot (Jean Servais). In addition to fielding a lot of embarrassing questions, Godot also has to deal with a pesky turf war with a rival mobster. Not that the ex-husband is a paragon of virtue: he's busy trying to get even with a crooked business associate.

An ill-assorted group of international criminals executes a tightly-planned ransom sting in Spain. Things go along swimmingly until various tensions within the group come to the fore.

To repay a debt, Marcel must commit a robbery in a large department store. Unfortunately his booty is intercepted by a gang of thugs.

Gerard, a young man from a "good family" dreams of becoming an actor. To do this, he follows everywhere his sister Frédérique who is infatuated with cinéma vérité.

A crime story writer comes to the French Alps for vacation. However, an envelope given by a strange man, would put him in a conflict between two teams of spies. A young blonde hotel burglar will help him get out of this mess.

Normandy, France, 1976. After 2 years of wild love with Nadia, Pouplard, an unemployed heating engineer working in his girlfriend's butcher shop, decides to marry her and leave his wife and daughter. He'll have to struggle against his own jealousy and Nadia's incredible sex appeal to get through this 'moment de vie'.

A writer discovers a link between a vegetarian restaurant and a series of mysterious deaths.

When he learns that his daughter is to be engaged to the son of a rich businessman, Leon Martin realizes that extreme measures are needed to create a good impression.

Sentimental marivaudage between Nicole, her husband Christian, her friend Alexandre and a provincial girl, Marie-Josèphe, who marries Alexandre after arousing Nicole's jealousy.

Two married women on vacation decide to see who the better seductress is. When the local authorities investigate the death of a local prostitute, their husbands do what they can to avoid trace of scandal and any implication that their wives are involved. Cracks in their relationships are revealed as is the hedonism and hypocrisy amongst the bourgeoise.

Three gangsters on the run break into a rehabilitation center for delinquent teenagers run by the couple Roger and Irène. The residents are divided over how to deal with the three bad guys, who want to take over the home.

A beautiful and sophisticated teenager is placed in a regimented French girls' boarding school after her father apparently commits suicide over a business scandal. She immediately gains admirers -- a lustful middle-aged artist, a handsome young composer, a fellow female student -- as well as a jealous rival. With the help of her schoolmates, she attempts to elope with the composer, but the adults catch on to the plot, and she is locked into her room at night.

Violette and François are a couple with a child. As they cannot lead a good life with odd jobs, François starts to steal.

Martine is a young woman plagued both by poverty and by uncaring, problem parents who in no way can provide the kind of nurturing that Martine needs during her adolescent years. As a result of her family situation, Martine runs away from home and gets involved with a group of teens and young adults from the wrong side of the moral tracks.

A police commissioner lives with his two children, wife, mother-in-law and maid. But he discovers that he has been poisoned with arsenic, and that the culprit must be someone close to him.

A French animal lover protects a dog and a mouse wanted by Soviet scientists for their space program.

A French variety show.

A talk show presented by Michel Drucker