Henri Langlois: The Phantom of the Cinematheque

At a little over two hours, there's a lot of Langlois to digest. But cinephiles won't mind a bit: Richard includes tons of great anecdotes and clips from classic films that wouldn't exist if Langlois hadn't saved them.

Jacques Richard has fashioned an adoring tribute to this wonderfully maniacal man.

While the astonishing street footage of "l'affaire Langlois"--perhaps more familiar to the French than to us--is where this exhaustive talking-heads portrait becomes beautifully, bafflingly surreal, the whole project, however conventional, has the allure of a communal embrace, a home movie of a motherland left irrevocably in the past.

A labor of love made over the course of seven years that crucially matches the energy and passion Langlois himself embodied, this deep-dish account of the life and times of the longtime head of the Cinematheque Francaise will enthrall buffs.

A sound piece of profiling that has miles of archival footage of the affable, pop-eyed Langlois enthusing.

An inspirational film for cinephiles everywhere.

Though Phantom Of The Cinematheque is fascinating throughout, Richard squanders a chance to recreate one of those long Parisian nights where Langlois held court for his fellow movie buffs.