“Peril in Home” director Michael Deville dies
The French filmmaker, a contemporary of the New Wave, died in his sleep at home on February 16 at the age of 91.
French filmmaker Michel Deville.
AFP/GABRIEL BOUYS
Director Michel Deville, who has died aged 91, directed some of the best French actresses of the 20th century in light comedies and later black and grotesque tales.
Author of some thirty films, he received two Césars, the French Oscars, for “Le Dossier 51” (1979, best screenplay) and “Peril in the home” (1986, best director). He also won the Louis-Delluc Prize (considered the Concorde of cinema) for “Benjamin or Memoirs of a Maiden” (1967) and “La Lectrice” (1988).
“All my films, other serious, comedies like serious, were games for me with rules,” said the bony-faced, steely-blue eyes, who loved above all to treat people against their instincts.
“One Moment, One Sentence”
If she were cast with actors like Michel Piccoli, Jacques Dutronc or Jean-Louis Trindignant, she said she would not like “the company of men”.
On the other hand, he directed actresses such as Catherine Deneuve, Brigitte Bardot, Romy Schneider, Jeanne Morey, François Fabian, Fanny Ardant, Matilda May, Marina Vlady, Marlene Jaubert or Mio-Mio.
Michael Deville, a self-professed loner and sociable, is a sophisticated filmmaker gifted with capturing “a moment, a sentence, a beautiful landscape, a beautiful face” on film. “It is not enough for me to see them, I must remember them. I record them in my notebooks,” he explained.
A scene from the movie “Beryl in the House”.
Caumont
Even the poet
To him, writing, in all its forms, was essential. Most of his films are taken from literary works he adapted. So, he will film “The Reader” or “Le Dossier 51” from the book by Gilles Perrault, adapted from Raymond Jean’s novel.
He practiced poetry, his “retirement”, publishing many fanciful and irreverent collections, close to the spirit of a brevert or a quenot: “Dance l’aupe halluciné / d’un jardin vague and mal fane / a gardener (…) / legs Buried in manure and instead of two leagues (…) / Heartbreaking defeat, atrocity / The gardener sows himself”.
Michel Deville was born on April 13, 1931 in Boulogne-Billancourt (Hauts-de-Seine). His parents have friends next door whose apartment overlooks the rooftop of a cinema. Thanks to a catwalk, the boy often visits the projection booth. Thus starting a business…
He spent ten years learning the trade, particularly from his mentor, Henri DeCoin. Later, he made his debut in “Tonight or Never”, a dramatic comedy. It was followed by comedies like “Adorable Mendoza” (1962) or “A Cause, For a Woman”. He enjoyed success with “Benjamin…” interpreted by Michael Morgan, Michael Piccoli and Pierre Clementi. In 1970, he directed Brigitte Bardot in the comedy “The Bear and the Doll”.
“Raphael or Depachy”
After “Raphael or the Debauched” (1971), Michael Deville opens up more serious subjects between police intrigues and sensuality behind intimate, closed doors, sometimes against the backdrop of manipulation and problematic relationships between men and women.
It was in the same year 1971, when his collaboration with Nina Kompanis ended, while screenwriter, dialogue writer and editor of most of his films, he decided to become a director. “We grew old together and that was good, but we were always in the same groove and our numbers were well established”, he later said.
Since the 80s, his wife Rosalinde has written and produced his films: “She writes what I dream of seeing in the cinema,” said this unclassifiable childless artist. Later he adapted Martin Winkler and produced films such as “Beryl in the Home” (1985), “Le Baldoquet” (1986) or “Sachs Disease”.
In 2005 he adapted Faydo for his last film “Un fill à la batte” with Emmanuelle Baird and Charles Berling.
AFP
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