Henri-Georges Clouzot: The Cinema of Disenchantment (France, 1956-1968)

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Henri-Georges Clouzot: The Cinema of Disenchantment

Tempered by the pessimism of war-torn France, director Henri-Georges Clouzot’s brand of hard-edged realism made for gripping genre films, often mysteries and thrillers, that contained within them a near-misanthropic vision of man. Yet his best-remembered works, the dread-inducing The Wages of Fear (1953) and Diabolique (1955), have a paradoxical sympathy for their characters, a sympathy based upon the recognition that when left to our own devices, we will helplessly choose the baser path.

Clouzot’s virtuosic way with suspense, often tinged with sardonic humor, earned him the title “French Hitchcock,” yet many of his finest criminal concoctions find greater affinity with French-coined film noir and its scenic foreboding, distracted cynicism, and dim view of human desire. Not even love gets a cautious embrace from this dry-eyed existentialist who seemed to think that la petite mort naturally leads to its grand conclusion and released a string of pearls, dangling amour fou before us with Manon (1949), La vérité (1960), and Woman in Chains (1968).

From his self-assured first feature, The Murderer Lives at Number 21 (1942), with its houseful of quirky suspects, through the ravenous Le corbeau (1943) and its contagion of accusation, to The Spies (1958), in which Cold War conflicts play out in a psychiatric ward, Clouzot has given us beautifully detailed and dispatched dramas that inspect the inky depths of society while lavishing us with the ironic pleasures of dread and disquiet. Don’t miss this chance to look in the darker corners of Clouzot’s career.

Steve Seid, Video Curator

This series would not be possible without the support of the Institut Français, Paris and the Cultural Services of the French Embassy. We wish to thank in particular Delphine Selles-Alvarez of the Cultural Services for her diligent attention, as well as Denis Bisson, Cultural Attaché, French Consulate, San Francisco. Special thanks to: Haden Guest and David Pendleton, Harvard Film Archive; Josh Siegel, Film Department, The Museum of Modern Art; and James Quandt, TIFF Cinematheque. Finally, we wish to acknowledge critic David Thomson whose Clouzot-related quote “the cinema of total disenchantment” was the inspiration for the series title.



Thursday / 2.2.12
7:00
La vérité
Henri-Georges Clouzot (France, 1960)

(The Truth). In this inquiring look at youth culture of early sixties Paris, twenty-six-year-old Brigitte Bardot plays Dominique, a sexually liberated Left Banker who seeks aimless amusements to delay the gloom of contemporary life. La vérité begins in a courtroom where an alternately defiant and remorseful Dominique is on trial for the murder of her lover Gilbert (Sami Frey). Clouzot also alternates between the merits of the sensational case argued eloquently by Clouzot regulars, Charles Vanel and Paul Meurisse, and sharply nuanced flashbacks that flesh out Dominique and her bohemian rhapsody. Bardot throws more than just her body into the role, perhaps because as protofeminist Dominique, she was finally talking about her generation. Steve Seid

Written by Clouzot, Jérôme Géronimi, Simone Drieu, Michèle Perrein, Christiane Rochefort, Véra Clouzot. Photographed by Armand Thirard. With Brigitte Bardot, Sami Frey, Marie-José Nat, Charles Vanel. (130 mins, In French with English subtitles, B&W, 35mm, From Sony Pictures)

Friday / 2.3.12
8:50
Woman in Chains
Henri-Georges Clouzot (France, 1968)

(La prisonnière). Clouzot’s final foray into features takes us into another tortured love triangle to explore voyeurism and, by extension, the very gaze that so draws us to cinema. Josée (Elisabeth Wiener) meets her artist-lover’s gallerist, the chic but kinky Stanislas Hessler (Laurent Terzieff), whose hobby is photographing female nudes in S and M postures. Naturally, Josée succumbs to the temptation to pose, but finds she needs bonding not bondage. Enter the obsessive kinetic artist Gilbert (Bernard Fresson), and the triangulated trap is sprung. Like Peeping Tom released the same year, Woman in Chains uses the camera’s gaze as a substitute for our own voyeuristic impulse. Steve Seid

Written by Clouzot, Monique Lange, Marcel Moussy. Photographed by Andreas Winding. With Laurent Terzieff, Elisabeth Wiener, Bernard Fresson, Dany Carrel. (105 mins, In French with English subtitles, Color, 35mm, From Tamasa Films)

Saturday / 2.4.12
5:30
The Mystery of Picasso
Henri-Georges Clouzot (France, 1956)

Also playing on Wednesday / 2.1.12 p.15

One of the most exciting and joyful movies ever made!—Pauline Kael

(Le mystère Picasso). “To know what’s going through a painter’s mind, one just needs to look at his hands,” says Clouzot in voice-over. Ironically, hands are not what we see in Clouzot’s intriguing glimpse of Picasso; instead, we gaze upon a multitude of disembodied brushstrokes. In a style devised for the film, Clouzot sets up a camera behind a translucent surface, so that the maestro’s every painterly gesture is recorded. Paintings emerge from the seemingly effortless frenzy of flourishes, some successful, some merely a mimicry of Picasso performing himself. Winner of the Palme d’Or at Cannes, this colorful glimpse of the seventy-five-year-old Picasso captures the fecund nature of his creative process. Steve Seid

Written by Clouzot. Photographed by Claude Renoir. With Pablo Picasso. (78 mins, In French with English subtitles, Color/B&W, 35mm, ’Scope in part, From Institut Français, permission Milestone Film and Video)

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