The Graduation (Le concours)

Claire Simon's The Competition (Le Concours) begins, significantly, with the image of a locked gate - that of the Fondation Européenne pour les Métiers de l'Image et du Son, or, as it's more popularly known, La Fémis. One of the most prestigious film schools in the world, offering hands-on training from working professionals, every year La Fémis attracts hundreds upon hundreds of applicants hoping to fill only forty annual slots. This new film by Simon, one of France's premiere nonfiction filmmakers, offers a unique look into the process whereby those lucky forty are selected?a process involving examiners from the French film industry which is highly personal and idiosyncratic and subject to the vagaries of taste and personal prejudice.