It’ll be a case of “Tous pour un, un pour tous” when the 35th Alliance Française French Film Festival kicks off at Palace Cinemas on March 7 with The Three Musketeers: D’Artagnan.

French or no French, you knew it was familiar – that’s “All for one, and one for all”, the catch cry of the swashbuckling Musketeers, and the choice of opening-night film, signals a focus on colour, fun, love, death, adventure and more than the usual array of fabulous historical costumes.

And if the 121-minute romp isn’t enough, there’s part two, The Three Musketeers: Milady, in which Eva Green plays the mysterious Milady de Winter getting deeply involved in the darker side of King Louis XIII’s court – there’ll even be the chance to view both movies back-to-back.

The festival, grandly billed as the world’s largest showcase of French cinema outside of France and the biggest cultural paid event in Australia, boasts 41 feature films.

There’ll be more period costumes in the lavish Jeanne Du Barry from actor/writer/director Maïwenn. Filmed on location at Versailles it’s the story of the mistress of King Louis XV. The king’s played by Johnny Depp in his first French-language speaking role, but when I catch up with Maureen Simon-Dou, culture and communication manager at the Alliance Française de Canberra, she’s not absolutely convinced of Depp’s French accent.

Bonnard, Pierre & Marthe is a new historical drama about the turbulent love story between the famous post-Impressionist painter and his lesser-known but highly influential wife.

A period piece from a very different era sees Catherine Deneuve playing Bernadette, wife of former President Jacques Chirac in The President’s Wife: Bernadette, a comedy more or less based on fact. Sometimes considered the French version of Hillary Clinton, she found herself brushed off as cold and sour-tempered. But the film shows her attempting to reverse that impression. 

Deneuve is in this year’s movie line-up, but fading star Gerard Depardieu is nowhere to be seen. Not to worry, there are plenty more famous names to choose from. Juliette Binoche, for instance, plays Eugénie, a renowned cook in The Taste of Things, which won director Tran Anh Hung the Best Director prize at Cannes.

As usual, the French film Festival, curated from Sydney by Karine Mauris, offers a wide range of experiences, explaining why it continues to secure its audiences. 

There’s a Ladies Night (Bernadette) The Taste Of Things night (Binoche) and in a nod to other Francophone countries, Swiss, Canadian and Belgian nights.

There’s a birthday party on March 26, marking 35 years of the Alliance Française French Film Festival in Australia, where they’ll be be screening The Intouchables, voted by festival-goers the most popular film of all time and an exploration of an extraordinary friendship between a wealthy paraplegic and his immigrant caregiver.

There’s an impressive youth selection, including the animation Nina and the Secret of the Hedgehog, voiced by stars Audrey Tautou and Guillaume Canet.

A standout choice in Simon-Dou’s view and one suitable for all ages is Neneh Superstar, set in the Paris Opera Ballet School, where 12-year-old ballet dancer Neneh discovers that her natural talent and discipline may not be enough for the school’s discriminatory headmistress, played by Maïwenn from Jeanne du Barry. 

But to Simon-Dou and visiting French student Juliette Piscione, some of the politically-themed choices are of even greater interest. 

In The Sitting Duck, for instance (a great translation of its original title, La Syndicaliste), Isabelle Huppert plays real-life whistle blower Maureen Kearney, a trade unionist who challenges the powerful nuclear industry.

And in All Your Faces, a drama about France’s Restorative Justice program, (which was first introduced in Australia in 2001 and later in France in 2014) six characters, three offenders and three victims cautiously take part in the process. In Canberra, the festival will team with the ANU for a special session about this topic on March 28.

The closing night film, Second Round, shows fictional, disgraced journalist Nathalie Pove unexpectedly hauled back into current affairs to cover the upcoming presidential election.

The 35th Alliance Française French Film Palace Electric, March 7-April 2.