French actress Juliette Binoche has criticized the American concept of beauty, insisting people in the U.S. only value “youth and big breasts.”

The Oscar winner, 44, is convinced older women are more accepted in her native France, whereas in America, most females over the age of 40 are not considered beautiful.

And the star is horrified by the number of actresses undergoing cosmetic surgery in a bid to keep their youthful looks.

She says, “Personally I’ve always thought French women bloom at 40 and for me it’s completely true. In France, beauty is much more subtle, and there is a greater acceptance of age.

“Whereas in America, they think youth and big breasts define beauty. We think it’s more about looking after yourself than going down the artificial route.

“Botox makes people look older. You look at women who have had it, you see the fear of aging on their face.”

Source: SFGate.com

By Wesley Morris to The Boston Globe

A year at the Yale School of Drama costs $25,735. Juilliard is about $1,500 more. And you don’t even want to know what an education from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art will set you back. For aspiring movie actors, it would be a lot cheaper just to study the career of Juliette Binoche. A week with her movies might not make you a better actor - although I don’t see how it couldn’t. But it may make you wiser about the acting you should aspire to do. Binoche is as good an example as we have of an actor who appreciates the realities of a flattening world. She works in her native France but not always for the French. The American film industry for her is a nice place to visit but not to live in. Binoche is acting globally. Read more… »

By Michael Phillips to Chicago Tribune

See here a video from Juliette talking about FOTRB

It sounds cliched, as does the nature of the film itself, but “Flight of the Red Balloon” is a gem made by a filmmaker who loves life, and knows how to capture its ebb and flow and sweet complication.

This quiet, patient masterwork comes from the Taiwanese filmmaker Hou Hsiao Hsien, here exploring two foreign territories: modern-day Paris, and the storybook Paris represented by the 1956 classic “The Red Balloon,” in which Albert Lamorisse delivered a hardy fable of childhood resistance. Juliette Binoche stars in “Flight of the Red Balloon,” but this is not a star vehicle. It is, rather, proof that largely improvised story, characters and dialogue can be approached with the kind of visual rigor and humanistic touch only a handful of contemporary cinema artists have to offer. Read more… »

Freep.com: After retro screenings of 1956’s “The Red Balloon” last season, the DFT now premieres “Flight of the Red Balloon” (***), a tribute to the old film and a subtle character study. Juliette Binoche stars as a Paris performance artist trying to balance work and motherhood while the title balloon appears as a curious observer. In French with English subtitles. Unrated; language. 1 hour, 54 minutes. 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 4 and 7 p.m. Sunday at the Detroit Film Theatre at the DIA.