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Clu Gulager, the real-life cowboy from Oklahoma known for his turns on The Tall Man, The Virginian, The Last Picture Show and horror movies including The Return of the Living Dead, has died. He was 93.
Gulager died Friday of natural causes at the Los Angeles home of his son John and daughter-in-law Diane, they told The Hollywood Reporter.
Gulager also portrayed the protégé of hitman Charlie Strom (Lee Marvin) taken out by a mob boss (Ronald Reagan) in Don Siegel’s The Killers (1964), a race-car mechanic opposite Paul Newman in Winning (1969) and a detective working alongside John Wayne’s character in John Sturges’ McQ (1974).
More recently, he showed up on the big screen in such critical darlings as Tangerine (2015), Blue Jay (2016) and Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019).
Gulager’s performance in The Killers convinced Peter Bogdanovich to cast him as Abilene,...
Clu Gulager, the real-life cowboy from Oklahoma known for his turns on The Tall Man, The Virginian, The Last Picture Show and horror movies including The Return of the Living Dead, has died. He was 93.
Gulager died Friday of natural causes at the Los Angeles home of his son John and daughter-in-law Diane, they told The Hollywood Reporter.
Gulager also portrayed the protégé of hitman Charlie Strom (Lee Marvin) taken out by a mob boss (Ronald Reagan) in Don Siegel’s The Killers (1964), a race-car mechanic opposite Paul Newman in Winning (1969) and a detective working alongside John Wayne’s character in John Sturges’ McQ (1974).
More recently, he showed up on the big screen in such critical darlings as Tangerine (2015), Blue Jay (2016) and Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019).
Gulager’s performance in The Killers convinced Peter Bogdanovich to cast him as Abilene,...
- 8/6/2022
- by Mike Barnes
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
In film history, the anthology genre is the most challenging. Episodic films often have several directors and screenwriters which gives them an inconsistent tone and quality. But the genre’s pitfalls haven’t stopped such filmmakers including Akira Kurosawa (“Dreams”), the Coens (“The Ballad of Buster Scruggs”), Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez (“Sin City”); Woody Allen, Francis Ford Coppola and Martin Scorsese (“New York Stories”); and Joe Dante, John Landis, George Miller and Steven Spielberg (“Twilight Zone: The Movie”).
Wes Anderson joined them with his latest film “The French Dispatch,” which received a nine-minute standing ovation at the Cannes Film Festival. The comedy brings to life three stories from an American magazine published in a fictional French city and features his stock company of actors including Bill Murray, Jason Schwartzman, Adrien Brody and Owen Wilson.
If you are a fan of the genre, here are the best anthology movies that...
Wes Anderson joined them with his latest film “The French Dispatch,” which received a nine-minute standing ovation at the Cannes Film Festival. The comedy brings to life three stories from an American magazine published in a fictional French city and features his stock company of actors including Bill Murray, Jason Schwartzman, Adrien Brody and Owen Wilson.
If you are a fan of the genre, here are the best anthology movies that...
- 10/30/2021
- by Susan King
- Gold Derby
French screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière, who has penned the scripts for films including The Unbearable Lightness of Being and That Obscure Object of Desire, has died. His daughter Kiara Carrière told Afp that the screenwriter died on Monday of natural causes at his Paris home. He was 89.
Throughout his decades-long career as a writer, actor and director, Carriere received a number of awards and recognitions for his work. Carrière shared his first Academy Award with Pierre Etaix, winning best short subject for Heureux anniversaire. In 1969, The Nail Clippers (La pince à ongles) took home the Cannes grand jury prize for best short film. In addition to BAFTA and César wins throughout the years, Carrière received an Honorary Oscar of his body of work as a screenwriter in 2014.
Born in 1931, Carrière was born in a small village in the south of France and trained as a historian. After publishing his first novel...
Throughout his decades-long career as a writer, actor and director, Carriere received a number of awards and recognitions for his work. Carrière shared his first Academy Award with Pierre Etaix, winning best short subject for Heureux anniversaire. In 1969, The Nail Clippers (La pince à ongles) took home the Cannes grand jury prize for best short film. In addition to BAFTA and César wins throughout the years, Carrière received an Honorary Oscar of his body of work as a screenwriter in 2014.
Born in 1931, Carrière was born in a small village in the south of France and trained as a historian. After publishing his first novel...
- 2/9/2021
- by Alexandra Del Rosario
- Deadline Film + TV
It would be a great mistake, sight unseen, to pigeonhole Ulrike Ottinger’s “Paris Calligrammes” as just another nostalgia-filled personal documentary about how amazing life was in Paris in the 1960s. Where others self-servingly wax lyrical about being in the nexus of the Left Bank’s Golden Age of hipness and activism, Ottinger takes us through this formative time of her life in a way that deftly balances past and present to paint a picture of a threshold era of both positives and negatives.
Recounted in the director’s own measured voiceover (the English version features Jenny Agutter while the French version has Fanny Ardant) and largely composed of found footage, film clips and home movies, the film reflects the director’s generosity of spirit as well as the period’s bubbling cauldron of syncretic and opposing movements. Promoted together with a handsome book tie-in, “Paris Calligrammes” should spark renewed...
Recounted in the director’s own measured voiceover (the English version features Jenny Agutter while the French version has Fanny Ardant) and largely composed of found footage, film clips and home movies, the film reflects the director’s generosity of spirit as well as the period’s bubbling cauldron of syncretic and opposing movements. Promoted together with a handsome book tie-in, “Paris Calligrammes” should spark renewed...
- 3/6/2020
- by Jay Weissberg
- Variety Film + TV
Close-Up is a feature that spotlights films now playing on Mubi. Jean Renoir's The Testament of Dr. Cordelier (1959) is playing August 3 - September 2, 2017 in the United States as part of the series Jean Renoir.Jean Renoir frequently focused on complicated characters who toe the line between right and wrong. They are often trapped by social mores, for better or for worse. In works like The Crime of Monsieur Lange (1936) or The River (1951), characters are unfairly confined, while in films like La chienne (1931) or La bête humaine (1938), a breaking from custom is fatally dangerous. Even in more light-hearted fare, such as French Cancan (1954), a bold flaunting of convention is cause for conflict and scandal. It seems only logical, then, that Renoir in his interest in the imposed customs of community and the social construction of morals would be drawn to Robert Louis Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde...
- 8/10/2017
- MUBI
The 23rd entry in an on-going series of audiovisual essays by Cristina Álvarez López and Adrian Martin. Mubi is showing Jean Renoir's The Testament of Dr. Cordelier (1959) is August 3 - September 2, 2017 in the United States as part of the series Jean Renoir.Jean Renoir’s The Experiment of Dr. Cordelier (a.k.a. The Doctor’s Horrible Experiment, 1959), shot using the multi-camera set-up of a television production, is a free variation on Robert Louis Stevenson’s immortal tale, Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886). However, Renoir’s take on this material owes less to the horror genre than to a kind of speculative, philosophical fiction. Unlike in most screen versions of the Jekyll/Hyde duality, Renoir goes easy on the conventional distinction between the good and evil sides of a single personality. Yes, the figure of Opale, into whom Cordelier transforms himself, is destructive, bestial, cruel, and sadistic.
- 8/4/2017
- MUBI
Two films by Marcel Carné are playing on Mubi in the United States as part of the series Marcel Carné, Arletty, Jean Gabin: Le jour se lève (1939), from June 7 - July 7, and Air of Paris (1954), from June 8 - July 8, 2017.Marcel Carné’s 1937 film Drôle de drame (Bizarre, Bizarre) feels anomalous when placed next to his classic dramas. Unlike the sincere emotion, heartbreak, and despair which characterize his poetic realist works, Drôle de drame is a lighthearted and rather frivolous comedy of manners. The film depicts a series of absurd events caused by a need to maintain appearances, following meek botanist Irwin Molyneux (Michel Simon) as he lives a double life, writing crime novels in secret. When his cousin, the bishop Bedford (Louis Jouvet), accuses Molyneux of having killed his wife, the married couple go into hiding rather than rectify the mistake. Molyneux emerges with his novelist persona in order...
- 6/8/2017
- MUBI
World War, a solemn vow, and a promise betrayed lead to a ‘night of the living war dead’ – all cooked up by the director of Napoleon, Abel Gance. The early, famed pacifist fantasy is back in near-perfect condition and restored to its full length. It’s a reworking, not a remake, of Gance’s 1919 silent classic.
J’accuse
Blu-ray
Olive Films
1938 / B&W / 1:37 flat full frame / 120 min. / That They May Live; J’accuse: Fresque tragique des temps modernes vue et Réalisée par Abel Gance / Street Date November 15, 2016 / available through the Olive Films website / 29.98
Starring Victor Francen, Line Noro, Marie Lou, Jean-Max, Paul Amiot, Jean-Louis Barrault, Marcel Delaitre, Renée Devillers, Romuald Joubé, André Nox, Georges Rollin, Georges Saillard.
Cinematography Roger Hubert
Film Editor Madeleine Crétoile
Original Music Henri Verdun
Written by Abel Gance, Steve Passeur
Produced & Directed by Abel Gance
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Around 1973, UCLA film school professor Bob Epstein...
J’accuse
Blu-ray
Olive Films
1938 / B&W / 1:37 flat full frame / 120 min. / That They May Live; J’accuse: Fresque tragique des temps modernes vue et Réalisée par Abel Gance / Street Date November 15, 2016 / available through the Olive Films website / 29.98
Starring Victor Francen, Line Noro, Marie Lou, Jean-Max, Paul Amiot, Jean-Louis Barrault, Marcel Delaitre, Renée Devillers, Romuald Joubé, André Nox, Georges Rollin, Georges Saillard.
Cinematography Roger Hubert
Film Editor Madeleine Crétoile
Original Music Henri Verdun
Written by Abel Gance, Steve Passeur
Produced & Directed by Abel Gance
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Around 1973, UCLA film school professor Bob Epstein...
- 11/19/2016
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Each week, the fine folks at Fandor add a number of films to their Criterion Picks area, which will then be available to subscribers for the following twelve days. This week, the Criterion Picks focus on eight delightful French films.
Three decades of exceptional French cinema in the service of that most intoxicating, unpredictable and stubborn of muscles, to which laws of convention and commitment prove no barrier: the heart.
Don’t have a Fandor subscription? They offer a free trial membership.
Children of Paradise by Marcel Carne
Poetic realism reached sublime heights with Children Of Paradise, widely considered one of the greatest French films of all time. This nimble depiction of nineteenth-century Paris’s theatrical demimonde, filmed during World War II, follows a mysterious woman loved by four different men (all based on historical figures): an actor, a criminal, a count, and, most poignantly, a mime (Jean-Louis Barrault,...
Three decades of exceptional French cinema in the service of that most intoxicating, unpredictable and stubborn of muscles, to which laws of convention and commitment prove no barrier: the heart.
Don’t have a Fandor subscription? They offer a free trial membership.
Children of Paradise by Marcel Carne
Poetic realism reached sublime heights with Children Of Paradise, widely considered one of the greatest French films of all time. This nimble depiction of nineteenth-century Paris’s theatrical demimonde, filmed during World War II, follows a mysterious woman loved by four different men (all based on historical figures): an actor, a criminal, a count, and, most poignantly, a mime (Jean-Louis Barrault,...
- 9/22/2015
- by Ryan Gallagher
- CriterionCast
Marc Allégret: From André Gide lover to Simone Simon mentor (photo: Marc Allégret) (See previous post: "Simone Simon Remembered: Sex Kitten and Femme Fatale.") Simone Simon became a film star following the international critical and financial success of the 1934 romantic drama Lac aux Dames, directed by her self-appointed mentor – and alleged lover – Marc Allégret.[1] The son of an evangelical missionary, Marc Allégret (born on December 22, 1900, in Basel, Switzerland) was to have become a lawyer. At age 16, his life took a different path as a result of his romantic involvement – and elopement to London – with his mentor and later "adoptive uncle" André Gide (1947 Nobel Prize winner in Literature), more than 30 years his senior and married to Madeleine Rondeaux for more than two decades. In various forms – including a threesome with painter Théo Van Rysselberghe's daughter Elisabeth – the Allégret-Gide relationship remained steady until the late '20s and their trip to...
- 2/28/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Simone Simon: Remembering the 'Cat People' and 'La Bête Humaine' star (photo: Simone Simon 'Cat People' publicity) Pert, pretty, pouty, and fiery-tempered Simone Simon – who died at age 94 ten years ago, on Feb. 22, 2005 – is best known for her starring role in Jacques Tourneur's cult horror movie classic Cat People (1942). Those aware of the existence of film industries outside Hollywood will also remember Simon for her button-nosed femme fatale in Jean Renoir's French film noir La Bête Humaine (1938).[1] In fact, long before Brigitte Bardot, Annette Stroyberg, Mamie Van Doren, Tuesday Weld, Ann-Margret, and Barbarella's Jane Fonda became known as cinema's Sex Kittens, Simone Simon exuded feline charm – with a tad of puppy dog wistfulness – in a film career that spanned two continents and a quarter of a century. From the early '30s to the mid-'50s, she seduced men young and old on both...
- 2/20/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Simone Simon in 'La Bête Humaine' 1938: Jean Renoir's film noir (photo: Jean Gabin and Simone Simon in 'La Bête Humaine') (See previous post: "'Cat People' 1942 Actress Simone Simon Remembered.") In the late 1930s, with her Hollywood career stalled while facing competition at 20th Century-Fox from another French import, Annabella (later Tyrone Power's wife), Simone Simon returned to France. Once there, she reestablished herself as an actress to be reckoned with in Jean Renoir's La Bête Humaine. An updated version of Émile Zola's 1890 novel, La Bête Humaine is enveloped in a dark, brooding atmosphere not uncommon in pre-World War II French films. Known for their "poetic realism," examples from that era include Renoir's own The Lower Depths (1936), Julien Duvivier's La Belle Équipe (1936) and Pépé le Moko (1937), and particularly Marcel Carné's Port of Shadows (1938) and Daybreak (1939).[11] This thematic and...
- 2/6/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Translators introduction: This article by Mireille Latil Le Dantec, the first of two parts, was originally published in issue 40 of Cinématographe, September 1978. The previous issue of the magazine had included a dossier on "La qualité française" and a book of a never-shot script by Jean Grémillon (Le Printemps de la Liberté or The Spring of Freedom) had recently been published. The time was ripe for a re-evaluation of Grémillon's films and a resuscitation of his undervalued career. As this re-evaluation appears to still be happening nearly 40 years later—Grémillon's films have only recently seen DVD releases and a 35mm retrospective begins this week at Museum of the Moving Image in Queens—this article and its follow-up gives us an important view of a French perspective on Grémillon's work by a very perceptive critic doing the initial heavy-lifting in bringing the proper attention to the filmmaker's work.
Filmmaker maudit?...
Filmmaker maudit?...
- 11/30/2014
- by Ted Fendt
- MUBI
Above: 1960 re-release poster for Second Chance (Jean Delannoy, France, 1947).
A couple of weeks ago the invaluable New York movie poster store Posteritati unveiled their newest acquisitions: nearly 500 new posters including many superb, rare Czech designs and some stunning one-offs like this poster for a short film about Brian Eno. But one of the highlights for me was a small collection of posters by the German designer Isolde Monson-Baumgart, some of which I had never seen before.
I featured Baumgart’s sublime poster for The Earrings of Madame De... last year and have been looking for more work by her ever since. Baumgart, who passed away in 2011 at the age of 76, was one of the chief designers—under the late great Hans Hillmann—employed by the Neue Filmkunst, the arthouse distribution company founded by Walter Kirchner in 1953. Like many of her fellow designers who together revolutionized German film advertising in the 1960s,...
A couple of weeks ago the invaluable New York movie poster store Posteritati unveiled their newest acquisitions: nearly 500 new posters including many superb, rare Czech designs and some stunning one-offs like this poster for a short film about Brian Eno. But one of the highlights for me was a small collection of posters by the German designer Isolde Monson-Baumgart, some of which I had never seen before.
I featured Baumgart’s sublime poster for The Earrings of Madame De... last year and have been looking for more work by her ever since. Baumgart, who passed away in 2011 at the age of 76, was one of the chief designers—under the late great Hans Hillmann—employed by the Neue Filmkunst, the arthouse distribution company founded by Walter Kirchner in 1953. Like many of her fellow designers who together revolutionized German film advertising in the 1960s,...
- 6/6/2014
- by Adrian Curry
- MUBI
As we continue to move forward through the list, let us consider: how do you define an original screenplay? In theory, everything is based on something. Woody Allen’s Blue Jasmine is basically a modern A Streetcar Named Desire. But, somehow, Jasmine is classified as an original screenplay. When a film is wholly original, nothing like it had been done before, and others have tried to copy it since. Plenty of original screenplays (some in this list) take on tired genres, but flip the script. But the ones that really catch the audience by surprise are the ones that feel imaginative, creative, and different.
40. Spirited Away (2001)
Written by Hayao Miyazaki
That’s a good start! Once you’ve met someone, you never really forget them. It just takes a while for your memories to return.
No writer/director on this list may be more fantastical than the great Hayao Miyazaki,...
40. Spirited Away (2001)
Written by Hayao Miyazaki
That’s a good start! Once you’ve met someone, you never really forget them. It just takes a while for your memories to return.
No writer/director on this list may be more fantastical than the great Hayao Miyazaki,...
- 2/24/2014
- by Joshua Gaul
- SoundOnSight
Vivien Leigh biography, movies, and photo exhibit among centenary celebrations (photo: Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier as Emma Hamilton and Lord Nelson in ‘That Hamilton Woman’) [See previous post: "Vivien Leigh Turns 100: Centenary of One of the Greatest Movie Stars."] From November 30, 2013, to July 20, 2014, London’s National Portrait Gallery will be hosting a Vivien Leigh photo exhibit, tracing her life and career. The exhibit will be a joint celebration of both Leigh’s centenary and the 75th anniversary of Gone with the Wind. (Scroll down to check out a classy Vivien Leigh video homage. See also: “‘Gone with the Wind’ article.”) Additionally, the British Film Institute is hosting a lengthy Vivien Leigh and Gone with the Wind celebration, screening all of Leigh’s post-1936 movies, from Fire Over England to Ship of Fools — and including The Deep Blue Sea ("a digital copy of the only surviving 35mm print we were able to locate; the condition is variable"). I should add that Terence Davies recently...
- 11/7/2013
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Last night I finally finished watching Marcel Carne's 1945 film Children of Paradise. At just over three hours long it took me a couple sittings, though last night I watched the bulk of it (a little over two hours) and it's one hell of a piece of cinema. Roger Ebert describes the production saying it "was shot in Paris and Nice during the Nazi occupation and released in 1945. Its sets sometimes had to be moved between the two cities. Its designer and composer, Jews sought by the Nazis, worked from hiding. Carne was forced to hire pro-Nazi collaborators as extras; they did not suspect they were working next to resistance fighters. The Nazis banned all films over about 90 minutes in length, so Carne simply made two films, confident he could show them together after the war was over." The film largely focuses on an actor -- Frederick Lema?tre played by...
- 4/25/2013
- by Brad Brevet
- Rope of Silicon
Jekyll and Hyde Week continues at Trailers from Hell with screenwriter Sam Hamm introducing Jean Renoir's "The Testament of Dr. Cordelier," an unauthorized Robert Louis Stevenson adaptation. The great Jean Renoir made this unauthorized Robert Louis Stevenson adaptation as a multi-camera television quickie, which turned out so well it played theaters under the titles Experiment in Evil and The Doctor's Horrible Secret. Jean-Louis Barrault provides one of the more memorably eccentric Mr. Hyde performances. It can be seen in its entirety here.
- 12/5/2012
- by Trailers From Hell
- Thompson on Hollywood
Les Enfants du Paradis (Children Of Paradise)
Directed by Marcel Carné
Starring Arletty, Jean-Louis Barrault, and Pierre Brasseur
France, 190 min – 1945.
Les Enfants du Paradis is a film about that class of people that hangs on the outskirts of 1820s and 30s French society, exuberantly enjoying theatre productions in the ‘Boulevard du Crime.’ It is very much a piece that celebrates the bohemian artist (of an earlier generation than the famed bohemians depicted in Moulin Rouge) and the tragedies of love. This love centers around the beautiful woman-about-town and artist, Garance (Arletty), and the four men who fall in love with her: Jean-Baptiste Debureau (Jean-Louis Barrault), a famous pantomime actor, Frédérick Lemaître (Pierre Brasseur), an aspiring, classical actor, Pierre-François Lacenaire (Marcel Herrand), a criminal, and finally, Count Édouard de Montray (Louis Salou), a rich aristocrat. Each man falls in love with Garance, but she only gives her heart to one of them.
Directed by Marcel Carné
Starring Arletty, Jean-Louis Barrault, and Pierre Brasseur
France, 190 min – 1945.
Les Enfants du Paradis is a film about that class of people that hangs on the outskirts of 1820s and 30s French society, exuberantly enjoying theatre productions in the ‘Boulevard du Crime.’ It is very much a piece that celebrates the bohemian artist (of an earlier generation than the famed bohemians depicted in Moulin Rouge) and the tragedies of love. This love centers around the beautiful woman-about-town and artist, Garance (Arletty), and the four men who fall in love with her: Jean-Baptiste Debureau (Jean-Louis Barrault), a famous pantomime actor, Frédérick Lemaître (Pierre Brasseur), an aspiring, classical actor, Pierre-François Lacenaire (Marcel Herrand), a criminal, and finally, Count Édouard de Montray (Louis Salou), a rich aristocrat. Each man falls in love with Garance, but she only gives her heart to one of them.
- 11/22/2012
- by Karen Bacellar
- SoundOnSight
Today, we're featuring Marcel Marceau in 1983. Marceau joined Jean-Louis Barrault's company and was soon cast in the role of Arlequin in the pantomime, Baptiste which Barrault had interpreted in the film Les Enfants du Paradis. In 1947 Marceau created Bip the Clown and was first played at the Thtre de Poche Pocket Theatre in Paris. In his appearance he wore a striped pullover and a battered, beflowered silk opera hat.
- 11/8/2012
- by Walter McBride
- BroadwayWorld.com
Chicago – Marcel Carne is one of the most important filmmakers in European history and two of his most timeless efforts, “Children of Paradise” and “Les Visiteurs du Soir,” are two of the most recent films inducted into the most important collection of Blu-rays in the history of the form — The Criterion Collection. “Children” had been a Criterion release before (it’s spine #141) but “Visiteurs” (#626) is new to the collection. Both are gloriously restored version of French classics.
“Children” is the superior of the two, a film that has often been voted the best French film of the last century. It’s often compared to “Gone with the Wind” in its epic scope (it’s 190 minutes long) or at least that’s how it was sold in some markets — “The French Gone with the Wind!” The film is actually much more ambitious thematically than the American epic as wonderfully detailed in...
“Children” is the superior of the two, a film that has often been voted the best French film of the last century. It’s often compared to “Gone with the Wind” in its epic scope (it’s 190 minutes long) or at least that’s how it was sold in some markets — “The French Gone with the Wind!” The film is actually much more ambitious thematically than the American epic as wonderfully detailed in...
- 9/25/2012
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
(Marcel Carné, 1945, Second Sight, PG)
This vibrant three-hour epic was made during the German occupation by director Marcel Carné, poet Jacques Prévert and designer Alexandre Trauner, the chief creators of the so-called poetic realism that dominated French cinema in the late 1930s. The film then enjoyed a triumphant reception at its premiere in March 1945, just two months before Ve Day, when it helped assert the indomitable spirit of French culture and restore national pride.
The Nazi regime forbade direct reference to the war or any currently controversial matter, so the setting is the Parisian theatre of the 1830s, which is given a Balzacian social scope and dramatic vigour. Pierre Brasseur and Jean-Louis Barrault play rival actors, one a Shakespearean star, the other a brilliant mime, both of them in love with the cool, graceful Arletty's much-sought-after courtesan, who's also admired by a charismatic criminal and an aristocrat.
The movie...
This vibrant three-hour epic was made during the German occupation by director Marcel Carné, poet Jacques Prévert and designer Alexandre Trauner, the chief creators of the so-called poetic realism that dominated French cinema in the late 1930s. The film then enjoyed a triumphant reception at its premiere in March 1945, just two months before Ve Day, when it helped assert the indomitable spirit of French culture and restore national pride.
The Nazi regime forbade direct reference to the war or any currently controversial matter, so the setting is the Parisian theatre of the 1830s, which is given a Balzacian social scope and dramatic vigour. Pierre Brasseur and Jean-Louis Barrault play rival actors, one a Shakespearean star, the other a brilliant mime, both of them in love with the cool, graceful Arletty's much-sought-after courtesan, who's also admired by a charismatic criminal and an aristocrat.
The movie...
- 9/22/2012
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
By Raymond Benson
Children of Paradise has been called the greatest movie ever made in France, their equivalent to Gone With the Wind. Originally released in 1945 and directed by Marcel Carné, the three-hour historical epic is big in scope and ideas, and yet it is simplistic in its story about four men in love with the same woman. The excellent Criterion Collection label released the picture on DVD several years ago, but now they have given it the deluxe treatment with Pathé’s 2011 restoration and uncompressed monaural soundtrack in new Blu-ray and DVD editions. It looks and sounds amazing.
The story of the film’s production is just as fascinating as the picture itself. Made in Vichy France during the Nazi Occupation, Carné and his collaborator/writer Jacques Prévert had to work in secrecy, for the Nazis acted as “studio executives” and approved everything being made. The production designer and music composer were Jews,...
Children of Paradise has been called the greatest movie ever made in France, their equivalent to Gone With the Wind. Originally released in 1945 and directed by Marcel Carné, the three-hour historical epic is big in scope and ideas, and yet it is simplistic in its story about four men in love with the same woman. The excellent Criterion Collection label released the picture on DVD several years ago, but now they have given it the deluxe treatment with Pathé’s 2011 restoration and uncompressed monaural soundtrack in new Blu-ray and DVD editions. It looks and sounds amazing.
The story of the film’s production is just as fascinating as the picture itself. Made in Vichy France during the Nazi Occupation, Carné and his collaborator/writer Jacques Prévert had to work in secrecy, for the Nazis acted as “studio executives” and approved everything being made. The production designer and music composer were Jews,...
- 9/22/2012
- by nospam@example.com (Cinema Retro)
- Cinemaretro.com
How Les Enfants du Paradis, a French film about a theatre company, convinced the actress that a life on the stage – and in front of the cameras – was for her
I first saw Les Enfants du Paradis when I was about 16 and still at school. I was completely intoxicated by it. What I found so thrilling was the way it portrayed the world of the theatre. It made me realise that this was a place where art happened: it wasn't just a lot of nonsense. It was about the development of the soul: people spent their whole lives in the theatre and relished it and grew in it. I think that had a big effect on my decision to become an actress.
The film is set in the mid-19th century, but it was made in the early 1940s, while France was under German occupation, and what an extraordinary achievement...
I first saw Les Enfants du Paradis when I was about 16 and still at school. I was completely intoxicated by it. What I found so thrilling was the way it portrayed the world of the theatre. It made me realise that this was a place where art happened: it wasn't just a lot of nonsense. It was about the development of the soul: people spent their whole lives in the theatre and relished it and grew in it. I think that had a big effect on my decision to become an actress.
The film is set in the mid-19th century, but it was made in the early 1940s, while France was under German occupation, and what an extraordinary achievement...
- 7/28/2012
- by Killian Fox
- The Guardian - Film News
Blu-ray & DVD Release Date: Sept. 18, 2012
Price: DVD $29.95, Blu-ray $39.95
Studio: Criterion
Jean-Louis Barrault stars in Marcel Carne's Children of Paradise.
Poetic realism reached sublime heights with Marcel Carné’s 1945 romantic drama Children of Paradise, which is widely considered one of the greatest French films of all time.
A classic depiction of 19th century Paris’s theatrical demimonde, Les enfants du paradis follows a mysterious woman (Arletty, The Pearls of the Crown’s) loved by four different men (all based on historical figures): an actor, a criminal, a count, and, most poignantly, a street mime (Jean-Louis Barrault, La ronde).
Directed with sensitivity and dramatic élan (during World War II, no less!) director Carné (Port of Shadows) and screenwriter Jacques Prévert (Le jour se lève) bring to life a world teeming with hucksters and aristocrats, thieves and courtesans, pimps and seers, and, of course, love and sorrow.
Released previously by Criterion in...
Price: DVD $29.95, Blu-ray $39.95
Studio: Criterion
Jean-Louis Barrault stars in Marcel Carne's Children of Paradise.
Poetic realism reached sublime heights with Marcel Carné’s 1945 romantic drama Children of Paradise, which is widely considered one of the greatest French films of all time.
A classic depiction of 19th century Paris’s theatrical demimonde, Les enfants du paradis follows a mysterious woman (Arletty, The Pearls of the Crown’s) loved by four different men (all based on historical figures): an actor, a criminal, a count, and, most poignantly, a street mime (Jean-Louis Barrault, La ronde).
Directed with sensitivity and dramatic élan (during World War II, no less!) director Carné (Port of Shadows) and screenwriter Jacques Prévert (Le jour se lève) bring to life a world teeming with hucksters and aristocrats, thieves and courtesans, pimps and seers, and, of course, love and sorrow.
Released previously by Criterion in...
- 6/25/2012
- by Laurence
- Disc Dish
One of the pleasures of digging around for movie posters is coming across great designs for films that have otherwise been forgotten, that have not become part of the pantheon—or even any of its foothills—but which nevertheless are fascinating reminders of areas of cinema history that are usually ignored. The other day I posted a lovely Russian poster on Movie Poster of the Day for an adaptation of Dostoyevsky’s White Nights that I wasn’t familiar with but which, I then discovered, was directed by a man described as “the high priest of Stalinist Cinema.” You can read more about that here.
When this terrific poster for Le passe-muraille caught my eye I knew absolutely nothing about the film, and, with the exception of English actress Joan Greenwood (Kind Hearts and Coronets), nearly every name on the poster, from star Bourvil to director Jean Boyer to author Marcel Aymé,...
When this terrific poster for Le passe-muraille caught my eye I knew absolutely nothing about the film, and, with the exception of English actress Joan Greenwood (Kind Hearts and Coronets), nearly every name on the poster, from star Bourvil to director Jean Boyer to author Marcel Aymé,...
- 3/17/2012
- MUBI
Les enfants du paradis (Marcel Carné, 1945)
When I was about 11 years old my father stood me in front of the television at home and said: "This is a film you have to see." It was Les enfants du paradis, directed by Marcel Carné. Shot in Paris during the Nazi occupation, it's about a troupe of mime artists and performers in the 1880s.
It's a very beautiful, epic story, but what moved me the most was the scene where Jean-Louis Barrault, who plays the mime artist Jean-Baptiste Debureau, is performing a pantomime on stage, his face painted white. He looks into the wings and sees the woman he loves with another man. You see his face crack behind the mask. For me, that moment captured what acting is all about – what is happening behind the mask.
The French actor Arletty, who played the love interest Garance, aroused me as an 11-year-old boy.
When I was about 11 years old my father stood me in front of the television at home and said: "This is a film you have to see." It was Les enfants du paradis, directed by Marcel Carné. Shot in Paris during the Nazi occupation, it's about a troupe of mime artists and performers in the 1880s.
It's a very beautiful, epic story, but what moved me the most was the scene where Jean-Louis Barrault, who plays the mime artist Jean-Baptiste Debureau, is performing a pantomime on stage, his face painted white. He looks into the wings and sees the woman he loves with another man. You see his face crack behind the mask. For me, that moment captured what acting is all about – what is happening behind the mask.
The French actor Arletty, who played the love interest Garance, aroused me as an 11-year-old boy.
- 12/18/2011
- by Gemma Kappala-Ramsamy
- The Guardian - Film News
This long, romantic recreation of life – high, low and theatrical – in 1830s Paris, newly restored, has an outstanding cast headed by Pierre Brasseur and Jean-Louis Barrault as rival actors, one a Shakespearean star, the other a brilliant mime, and Arletty a much sought-after courtesan. It was made in two parts because films produced during the German occupation had to last under 90 minutes, and the film set out to celebrate the indomitable French spirit and assert cultural pride at a point when the humiliating defeat of 1940 was being replaced by a new if dubious self-respect created by the resistance.
The film was shot at the Victorine Studio in Nice on opulent sets designed by the great Alexandre Trauner, who as a Jew was in hiding in the nearby hills from which he emerged at night to inspect his work after slipping past German troops and pro-German militia. By contrast, the glamorous...
The film was shot at the Victorine Studio in Nice on opulent sets designed by the great Alexandre Trauner, who as a Jew was in hiding in the nearby hills from which he emerged at night to inspect his work after slipping past German troops and pro-German militia. By contrast, the glamorous...
- 11/13/2011
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
Black Pond (15)
(Tom Kingsley, Will Sharpe, 2011, UK) Chris Langham, Colin Hurley, Amanda Hadingue, Will Sharpe, Simon Amstell. 82 mins
First-time films are traditionally youthful coming-of-age stories, but this delightful little oddity revolves around a miserable middle-aged couple and the deaths of first their three-legged dog, then a very strange stranger they invite to dinner. Everything about it is pretty eccentric, in fact, with surreal animated interludes, an absurd cameo from Amstell and plenty of off-balance domestic comedy, not to mention the risky return of Langham. But in its own idiosyncratic way, it all fits together perfectly.
Wuthering Heights (15)
(Andrea Arnold, 2011, UK) Kaya Scodelario, James Howson, Shannon Beer. 129 mins
Discarding the usual niceties of costume drama, Arnold rolls Brontë's saga in the muck for this provocative, sensuous interpretation. Sublime to start with, it never quite recovers from a second-half change of cast.
The Rum Diary (15)
(Bruce Robinson, 2011, Us) Johnny Depp, Aaron Eckhart,...
(Tom Kingsley, Will Sharpe, 2011, UK) Chris Langham, Colin Hurley, Amanda Hadingue, Will Sharpe, Simon Amstell. 82 mins
First-time films are traditionally youthful coming-of-age stories, but this delightful little oddity revolves around a miserable middle-aged couple and the deaths of first their three-legged dog, then a very strange stranger they invite to dinner. Everything about it is pretty eccentric, in fact, with surreal animated interludes, an absurd cameo from Amstell and plenty of off-balance domestic comedy, not to mention the risky return of Langham. But in its own idiosyncratic way, it all fits together perfectly.
Wuthering Heights (15)
(Andrea Arnold, 2011, UK) Kaya Scodelario, James Howson, Shannon Beer. 129 mins
Discarding the usual niceties of costume drama, Arnold rolls Brontë's saga in the muck for this provocative, sensuous interpretation. Sublime to start with, it never quite recovers from a second-half change of cast.
The Rum Diary (15)
(Bruce Robinson, 2011, Us) Johnny Depp, Aaron Eckhart,...
- 11/12/2011
- by Steve Rose
- The Guardian - Film News
The restoration of the French theatreland classic only improves a glorious narrative carousel, as gripping as any soap opera
This restoration of Marcel Carné's 1945 classic reignites a glorious flame: a rich Balzacian drama that bulges with life, with incident, with romantic idealism, while the screenplay by Jacques Prévert has a superb and surreally turned bon mot every few minutes. The scene is the early 19th-century Boulevard du Crime in Paris, thronged with popular theatres and showfolk. French star Arletty plays Garance, a woman who entrances four different men: suave stage actor Frédérick (Pierre Brasseur), chilly aristocrat Count Edouard (Louis Salou), mime artist Baptiste (Jean-Louis Barrault) and Lacenaire, a criminal adventurer played by Marcel Herrand. The fascination with Garance keeps the narrative carousel turning, and it's as addictive as the most gripping soap opera. The writing is utterly involving; with lines like tiny, imagist poems. A rich and delicious movie treat.
This restoration of Marcel Carné's 1945 classic reignites a glorious flame: a rich Balzacian drama that bulges with life, with incident, with romantic idealism, while the screenplay by Jacques Prévert has a superb and surreally turned bon mot every few minutes. The scene is the early 19th-century Boulevard du Crime in Paris, thronged with popular theatres and showfolk. French star Arletty plays Garance, a woman who entrances four different men: suave stage actor Frédérick (Pierre Brasseur), chilly aristocrat Count Edouard (Louis Salou), mime artist Baptiste (Jean-Louis Barrault) and Lacenaire, a criminal adventurer played by Marcel Herrand. The fascination with Garance keeps the narrative carousel turning, and it's as addictive as the most gripping soap opera. The writing is utterly involving; with lines like tiny, imagist poems. A rich and delicious movie treat.
- 11/11/2011
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
Admired actor with an instinctive presence and austere looks
One of the greatest performances in the history of film was given by Claude Laydu, in the title role of Robert Bresson's Journal d'un Curé de Campagne (Diary of a Country Priest, 1951). As a young, sickly priest unable to resolve the problems of his small parish, and assailed by self-doubt, Laydu, who has died aged 84, brought his own spirituality, instinctive presence and intense ascetic looks to the role. His portrayal prompted Jean Tulard to write in his Dictionary of Film that "no other actor deserves to go to heaven as much as Laydu".
This is even more remarkable given that Bresson declared that "Art is transformation. Acting can only get in the way", and that he called his actors "models" whom he trained to remove all traces of theatricality and to speak in a monotonic manner. Bresson chose the 23-year-old from among many candidates,...
One of the greatest performances in the history of film was given by Claude Laydu, in the title role of Robert Bresson's Journal d'un Curé de Campagne (Diary of a Country Priest, 1951). As a young, sickly priest unable to resolve the problems of his small parish, and assailed by self-doubt, Laydu, who has died aged 84, brought his own spirituality, instinctive presence and intense ascetic looks to the role. His portrayal prompted Jean Tulard to write in his Dictionary of Film that "no other actor deserves to go to heaven as much as Laydu".
This is even more remarkable given that Bresson declared that "Art is transformation. Acting can only get in the way", and that he called his actors "models" whom he trained to remove all traces of theatricality and to speak in a monotonic manner. Bresson chose the 23-year-old from among many candidates,...
- 8/11/2011
- by Ronald Bergan
- The Guardian - Film News
From a masterpiece of film noir to classic Gene Kelly musical An American in Paris, French film critic Agnès Poirier chooses her favourite sets in the city
As featured in our Paris city guide
Les Enfants du Paradis, Marcel Carné, 1943-45
Penned by poet Jacques Prévert and featuring the enigmatic Arletty, dashing Pierre Brasseur and melancholic Jean-Louis Barrault, Les Enfants du Paradis takes place in Paris in the 1840s and tells the story of the contrarian love of Garance and Baptiste. One key scene takes place in the boulevard du Temple, known at the time as boulevard du Crime. "You smiled at me! Don't deny it, you smiled at me. Ah, life's beautiful and so are you. And now, I shall never leave your side. Where are we going? What! We've only been together for two minutes and already you want to leave me. When will I see you again?...
As featured in our Paris city guide
Les Enfants du Paradis, Marcel Carné, 1943-45
Penned by poet Jacques Prévert and featuring the enigmatic Arletty, dashing Pierre Brasseur and melancholic Jean-Louis Barrault, Les Enfants du Paradis takes place in Paris in the 1840s and tells the story of the contrarian love of Garance and Baptiste. One key scene takes place in the boulevard du Temple, known at the time as boulevard du Crime. "You smiled at me! Don't deny it, you smiled at me. Ah, life's beautiful and so are you. And now, I shall never leave your side. Where are we going? What! We've only been together for two minutes and already you want to leave me. When will I see you again?...
- 6/3/2011
- by Agnès Poirier
- The Guardian - Film News
It may not be appropriate to deal with a film widely regarded as the greatest film ever made in this column, which is dedicated to less than famous films, but Marcel Carne’s Les Enfants Du Paradis (1945) is not as well known in India where that other contender for the ‘greatest film’ – Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane (1941) – still rules, except perhaps among Francophiles. Les Enfants Du Paradis is set among actors and performers but it is different from other films generally of the category. If a comparison is to be made, a film like Joseph Manciewicz’s All About Eve (1950) deals with Broadway stars and their doings but it draws a clear dividing line between ‘world’ and ‘stage’. The stage is merely the space in which their relationships and rivalries manifest themselves and not important in itself. Carne’s film is different in as much as it is a paean to...
- 5/26/2011
- by MK Raghvendra
- DearCinema.com
Well we all knew this would happen. Back in February, when Criterion announced their epic digital streaming partnership with Hulu, they also quietly revealed that their streaming options on Netflix would be coming to an end over the course of the next year. While I haven’t been paying close attention to the Criterion Collection films that have been expiring since that announcement was made, I thought it would be helpful to all of you loyal Netflix subscribers to know that in about twelve days, 26 titles will be expiring on the 26th of May, 2011.
I’ve gone and linked to all of the titles below, so you can click on the cover art or the text, and be taken to their corresponding Netflix pages. While this isn’t everything that Criterion has to offer on Netflix, it is a nice chunk of really important films. If you don’t currently have a Netflix subscription,...
I’ve gone and linked to all of the titles below, so you can click on the cover art or the text, and be taken to their corresponding Netflix pages. While this isn’t everything that Criterion has to offer on Netflix, it is a nice chunk of really important films. If you don’t currently have a Netflix subscription,...
- 5/15/2011
- by Ryan Gallagher
- CriterionCast
'Dostoevskian' French actor with an aura of tormented youth
With his emaciated but hypnotically handsome face and lithe body, the French actor Laurent Terzieff, who has died of respiratory infection aged 75, graced the stage and films for more than half a century. There was always an aura of tormented youth about Terzieff which he carried into the classic roles of his maturity such as Luigi Pirandello's Henry IV (1989) and Shakespeare's Richard II (1991). His perfect diction and rhythmic precision made his rendering of Jean Cocteau's narration of Stravinsky's Oedipus Rex in Bob Wilson's production at the Théâtre du Châtelet in 1996 particularly exciting.
Terzieff's special talents were used by many of the great theatre producers of the day: Jean-Louis Barrault, Peter Brook, Roger Planchon, Maurice Garrel, Roger Blin and André Barsacq. He also directed dozens of plays, many at the Théâtre du Lucernaire in Montparnasse. Paradoxically, given his tormented persona as an actor,...
With his emaciated but hypnotically handsome face and lithe body, the French actor Laurent Terzieff, who has died of respiratory infection aged 75, graced the stage and films for more than half a century. There was always an aura of tormented youth about Terzieff which he carried into the classic roles of his maturity such as Luigi Pirandello's Henry IV (1989) and Shakespeare's Richard II (1991). His perfect diction and rhythmic precision made his rendering of Jean Cocteau's narration of Stravinsky's Oedipus Rex in Bob Wilson's production at the Théâtre du Châtelet in 1996 particularly exciting.
Terzieff's special talents were used by many of the great theatre producers of the day: Jean-Louis Barrault, Peter Brook, Roger Planchon, Maurice Garrel, Roger Blin and André Barsacq. He also directed dozens of plays, many at the Théâtre du Lucernaire in Montparnasse. Paradoxically, given his tormented persona as an actor,...
- 7/21/2010
- by Ronald Bergan
- The Guardian - Film News
Maurice Jarre, who wrote the hauntingly lovely "Lara's Theme" for "Dr. Zhivago" as well as the sweeping score for the epic "Lawrence of Arabia," has died. He was 84.
Jarre died in his home in Las Angeles, where he had lived for decades, Bernard Miyet, a friend of the composer and leader of the French musicians guild Sacem, said Monday. No cause of death was given.
"The world of film music is mourning one of its last great figures," Miyet said. "As well as his talent, Maurice Jarre cultivated an eternal good nature, a way of living and a simplicity that became legendary."
Jarre won three Academy Awards for best score for his work on the David Lean films "Lawrence of Arabia," "Dr. Zhivago" and "Passage to India." He also earned six other Oscar nominations for best score for "Sundays and Cybele," "The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean," "Messenger of God,...
Jarre died in his home in Las Angeles, where he had lived for decades, Bernard Miyet, a friend of the composer and leader of the French musicians guild Sacem, said Monday. No cause of death was given.
"The world of film music is mourning one of its last great figures," Miyet said. "As well as his talent, Maurice Jarre cultivated an eternal good nature, a way of living and a simplicity that became legendary."
Jarre won three Academy Awards for best score for his work on the David Lean films "Lawrence of Arabia," "Dr. Zhivago" and "Passage to India." He also earned six other Oscar nominations for best score for "Sundays and Cybele," "The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean," "Messenger of God,...
- 3/30/2009
- by By Duane Byrge
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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