Dir. Jean-Paul Lilienfeld, 2008, 87 min, 35mm
With Isabelle Adjani, Denis Podalydes, Yann Collette, Nathalie Besançon, Marc Citti, Yann Ebonge, and Kévin Azaï
In French with English subtitles

Adjani made a triumphant comeback and earned her fifth César Award as Sonia Bergerac, a harried drama teacher in a tough high school outside Paris. After confiscating a weapon from one of her students, Sonia takes her pupils hostage and makes a last-ditch attempt to teach them to reject racism, sexism, and violence—with a gun in hand.

At once a tragedy on the failures of French integration, a wry feminist manifesto, and a gripping thriller, Skirt Day was initially produced for television, where it met with such acclaim that it was released theatrically and became a sweeping cultural phenomenon.

“A third-act reveal in writer-director Jean-Paul Lilienfeld’s Skirt Day is meant to transform the film’s incendiary take on “the new France” into a subversive feminist tract.”
LA Weekly